
QassI MfS - 



Book , 



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THIRTY YEARS 



FOREIGN POLICY. 

A HISTORY OF THE SECRETARYSHIPS 

OF 

THE EARL OF ABERDEEN AND VISCOUNT 
PALMERSTON. 

IJV THE AUTHOR OP 

"THE RIGHT HON. B. DISRAELI, M.P., 

A LITERARY AN'l) POLITICAL BIOGRAPHY." 



LONDON: 

LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN, AND LONGMANS 

1855. 

[ The author of this work reserves to himself the right of translation.'] 






- 



1 i V-3 



London : 

A and G. A. Spottiswoode, 

k New-street-Square. 



PREFACE 



The publication of a book on Foreign Policy 
at a time when the public mind is so much 
excited by the great events which are hap- 
pening in the Crimea, and when our gallant 
soldiers are struggling so bravely against diffi- 
culties of every kind, may apparently need an 
apology. Yet the greatest victories are but glo- 
rious massacres unless followed by proportion- 
ate results. A work of this nature may possibly 
render the reasons for this mighty conflict more 
intelligible, and the conditions of a future peace 
more explicit. The labour of the diplomatist 
only commences as that of the warrior ends* 
The Foreign Minister at length supersedes the 



A 2 



IV PREFACE. 



War Minister. It is then necessary to review our 
Foreign Policy, that we may know what it is we 
are fighting for, and what we ought to ob- 



o 

tain. 



The subject indeed is of vast extent. To do 
justice to all the questions which Thirty Years 
of Foreign Policy immediately suggest, would 
require many pages. Such a work might be 
much more easily written in four volumes than in 
one. On reflection, however, the author de- 
termined to compress his subject into a single 
volume. He thought that though his difficulties 
might be increased by confining himself within 
such narrow limits, yet, if he were in any degree 
successful in his design, a much clearer and more 
comprehensive view of the whole field of nego- 
tiation might be presented in the smaller compass 
than in a work on a more extended scale. A 
Diplomatic History of these times is yet to be 
written ; it may possibly, at no distant time^ be 
attempted ; but even then a general sketch of the 
various subjects must be indispensable in order 
to estimate the relative influence of particular 
questions. 

The author has striven to do impartial justice 



PREFACE. V 

to two able ministers. He has studiously 
avoided pitting one against the other. He has 
endeavoured to look at the acts both of Lord 
Aberdeen and Lord Palmerston from one point 
of view. Carefully shunning the abstractions 
in which writers on Foreign Policy are prone 
to indulge, and making full allowance for the 
practical necessities of administration, the events 
as they arise are considered as they would 
appear to the English Secretary of State in 
Downing Street, and not as they might appear to 
a member of the Opposition, or to any extreme 
thinker. This method of judging political ques- 
tions may not be popular ; it is, however, the only 
one from which a just verdict on a minister can 
be pronounced. 

But the author could not hesitate to con- 
demn many of the measures which Lord Castle- 
reagh agreed to at the Congress of Vienna, 
because they involved great moral principles, 
which no minister can ever be excused for sacri- 
ficing. It is true that Lord Castlereagh reluct- 
antly consented to some of these stipulations ; 
but this pleading can never be accepted as a 
sufficient excuse for his public acts. Had Mr. 



VI PREFACE. 

Burke been alive in 1815, he would as fearlessly 
have condemned some of the articles of the 
Treaty of Vienna, as he did the first and second 
partitions of Poland. The author has also, 
throughout the book, advisedly drawn no dis- 
tinction between the general Treaty and the 
annexed treaties of that Congress ; because, if 
words have any meaning, they were under- 
stood to carry the same force, and can never 
safely be separated. This is the principle on 
which Lord Aberdeen and Lord Palmerston 
have invariably acted, and every prudent 
person must admit it to be the only principle 
which can ever give stability and permanence 
to such engagements. An opposite doctrine 
would makv, the Treaties of Vienna no treaties 
at all, and open a chasm to dangers of which it 
is impossible to calculate the magnitude. 

The view which the author has taken of the 
circumstances of 1829 and the conduct of Lord 
Aberdeen, is not such as has generally been 
adopted. But he humbly submits that it is 
the correct one, and hopes that those who shall 
dispute it, will not content themselves with 
vague assertions, but fairly meet argument with 
argument, and fact with fact. Much igno- 



PKEFACE. Vll 

ranee has been displayed in the hasty cen- 
sures which have been passed upon Lord 
Aberdeen. Most of the declarations of his as- 
sailants are so decidedly erroneous that, like 
dreams, they ought to be interpreted by con- 
traries. Whenever they confidently represent 
him as having done that of which they accuse 
him, as a general rule it may be as confidently 
assumed that he did just the reverse. One of 
the most recent calumnies which has been going 
the round of certain newspapers is, forsooth, that 
Lord Aberdeen, in 1828, was on such intimate 
terms with Prince Lieven and his family, that 
the Foreign Secretary sacrificed his public duty 
to this private friendship. Now the author may 
simply state, on unquestionable authority, that so 
far from Lord Aberdeen being as warmly attached 
to Prince Lieven as has been asserted, Lord 
Aberdeen's representations at St. Petersburg oc- 
casioned this ambassador's recall. 

What is said on the Afghanistan policy will 
probably surprise many persons. It, however, 
curiously coincides with some passages which 
Count Ficquelmont has written in a recent pam- 
phlet, published after that portion of this work 



Vlll PREFACE. 

was concluded. Count Ficquelmont has at length 
spoken out ; and in his Politique de la Russie ei 
les Principautes Danubiennes, really says some 
very sensible things, which it might be well for 
all ministers of state to take to heart. It would 
indeed be absurd to prevent Russia from en- 
croaching upon Turkey, and still to leave Cen- 
tral Asia open to her arms and her machinations. 
On consideration, it may appear that there is at 
least one more indispensable " point" which must 
be added to the other four, before a peace worthy 
of the name can be obtained. 



CONTENTS. 



Introduction - - Page 1 

CHAPTER I. 

A Historical Retrospect. — Foreign Policy of Elizabeth and 
of Cromwell. — First and Second Partitions of Poland. — - 
The Struggle against Napoleon - -20 

CHAP. II. 

The Congress of Vienna - - - - 42 

CHAP. III. 

Canning. — The Congress of Verona. — French Invasion of 
Spain. — Designs of the Holy Alliance. — Portugal. — 
Canning's Merits as a Statesman and Orator. — New 
Principles of Foreign Policy - - -66 

CHAP. IV. 

The Duke of Wellington and the Earl of Aberdeen. — 
Policy of the Wellington Administration. — Result of the 
Treaty of July 6. 1827.— Public Opinion in 1829. — The 
Whigs and Turkey. — Treaty of Adrianople. — The 
Secret Correspondence - - - - 93 

a 



X CONTENTS. 



CHAP. V. 



The Affairs of Greece Neutrality of Lord Aberdeen in 

the Civil War of Portugal. — - State of Europe in 1830.— 
Recognition of Louis Philippe as King of the French. — 
Fall of the Government - Page 137 

CHAP. VI. 

Lord Palmers ton as Foreign Secretary. — His previous career. 
— Friendship with France. — Holland and Belgium. — 
Russo-Dutch Loan. — Effects of False Economy. — Treaty 
of Unkiar Skelessi. — New Kingdom of Greece. — Spain 
and Portugal. — The Quadruple Alliance. — Peace at any 
Price - - - - - - lol 

CHAP. VII. 

Conduct of the Duke of Wellington while Foreign Minister. 
— Interference in Spain. — Difficulties of a Liberal Minis- 
ter negotiating with Absolute Governments. — Choice of 
an Ambassador to St. Petersburg. — The Emperor Nicho- 
las and the House of Commons. — A Gradual Change of 
Opinion on Foreign Policy. — Precarious State of Turkey. 
— Arrogance and Humiliation. — Discussions on Foreign 
Policy in 1836.— Mr. Bell and Circassia.— Mr. Urquhart. 
—Patriotism of William the Fourth - - 193 

CHAP. VIII. 

Commercial Treaties of the Whig Administrations. — 
Treaties with Austria and Turkey in 1838. — State of the 

East. — Sultan Mahmoud the Second and Mehemet AH 

Lord Palmerston's Policy in Syria and Egypt. — Treaty of 
the 13th of July, 1841. — Position of Lord Palmerston on 
the Retirement of the Melbourne Ministry - 228 



CONTENTS. XI 



CHAP. IX. 



The Power of England. — Extent of Dominion. — Disputes ' 
with America. — Northern Boundaries. — Right of Search. 

— Treaty of Washington. — Invasion of Affghanistan. — 
Consideration of Indian Policy - - Page 289 

CHAP. X. 

Lord Aberdeen's Foreign Policy continued to 1846. — The 
King of the French and his Chamber of Deputies. — 
Affairs of Spain and Greece. — Count Nesselrode's 
Memorandum of 1844. — Oregon Question. — Lord 
Aberdeen ------ 325 

CHAP. XL 

Intrigue. — Lord Palmerston again Foreign Minister. — 
Spanish Marriages. — Identity of the Policies of Lord 
Aberdeen and Lord Palmerston on this Question. — M. 
G-uizot. — Annexation of Cracow. — Discussion in the 
House of Commons. — Concurrence of Opinion. — An 
Apologist for the Partition of Poland. — Portugal and 

Switzerland. — Political Movements in Italy Mission of 

LordMinto. — Close of 1847 - - - 360 

CHAP. XII. 

Count De Montalembert's Speech, on Foreign Affairs. — 
Italian Revolutions. — Lord Palmerston's Policy in 1848. 

— Austria and Hungary. — Demands for the Surrender 
of Refugees. — Diplomatic Victory of Sir Stratford Can- 
ning. — Greek Question. — Debate in the House of Com- 
mons. — Lord Palmerston's Defence. — Mr. Gladstone's 
Letters to Lord Aberdeen. — Retirement of Lord Palmer- 
ston. — Conclusion - 392 



I 



THIETY YEAKS 



OF 



FOREIGN POLICY, 



INTRODUCTION. 

On the 27th of December, 1852, the Earl of 
Aberdeen, as prime minister of England, deve- 
loped his future policy in the House of Lords. 
An unusually large number of peers were as- 
sembled, the members of the House of Commons 
crowded round the throne, and the ambassadors 
of all the great powers occupied seats in the 
galleries. His exposition was attentively listened 
to ; but the most striking passage consisted 
of these remarkable words : " The truth is, 
my lords, that though there may have been 
differences in the execution, according to the 

B 



Z INTRODUCTION. 

different hands entrusted with the direction 
of affairs, the principles of the foreign policy of 
the country have, for the last thirty years, been 
the same." This opinion of the prime minister 
has been the cause of much controversy, and has 
been fiercely criticised. Party assailants, whose 
object it is to represent Lord Aberdeen and Lord 
Palmerston as inveterate antagonists, and as the 
representatives of two opposite courses of policy, 
have made this emphatic sentence of the vener- 
able statesman the text of much acrimonious 
commentary. His enemies have not hesitated 
to stigmatise this sentiment as dishonest, and 
as contradictory to the whole course of a long 
political career. Lord Aberdeen is, however, 
a man who thinks before he speaks, and 
this terse declaration may survive the inter- 
ested invectives which it has occasioned. To 
every man who calmly reflects on the events of 
his generation, these few words may afford a key 
to one of the noblest problems in modern times. 
They at once raise him above the angry present, 
and while illuminating the past, become an en- 
couraging beacon for the future. • 

The importance of this subject cannot be 
overrated. The history of Europe, the progress 
and the civilisation of mankind, are inseparably 



INTRODUCTION. 6 

connected with the foreign policy of England. 
But it has not always received the attention it 
deserved. Englishmen have, during the long 
era of peace, been so attentive to their domestic 
reforms, and the internal administration of their 
empire, that only at rare intervals have they 
taken into full consideration the question of 
their external relations, and the influence which 
England has exercised on other nations. It is 
time that we should awaken from our apathy, 
and consent to be instructed even by an Austrian 
statesman. As Englishmen we are under obli- 
gations to Count Ficquelmont. He has seen the 
importance of this question, and has set about 
discussing it in all its bearings. Though he is 
the bitter foe of England, and believes her policy 
to be in the highest degree pernicious to the 
Continental governments, it is but right that we 
sh ould be taught by an enemy, and do what we 
can to vindicate ourselves from misrepresentation 
and malevolence. It is but right that English- 
men should take up the gauntlet which has been 
thrown down. Not by a minister of Austria only 
does our foreign policy deserve to be studied. 
We owe it to ourselves, we owe it to our an- 
cestors, we owe it to our children, we owe 
it to all future generations of Englishmen, and 

B 2 



4 INTRODUCTION 

to all who may in the most distant times re- 
spect the name of England, to show that at 
this momentous epoch in human affairs we were 
not indifferent to our good name, nor insensible 
to our glorious vocation. 

Count Ficquelmont's elaborate production is 
entitled, Lord Palmerston, l'Angleterre, et Le 
Continent. The work might, at least, have 
been expected to make its appearance while 
Lord Palmerston was Secretary of State for 
Foreign Affairs. But this was not the case. 
The first volume was published after his lord- 
ship's retirement from the Whig Ministry ; and 
the second has been issued since the accession of 
Lord Aberdeen to power. Count Ficquelmont's 
opinions, therefore, do not depend on circum- 
stances. Lord Palmerston is the nightmare that 
is ever oppressing him : the two volumes which 
he has produced are but the introduction to the 
many that are to follow on the same inex- 
haustible topic. In the interval, furious pam- 
phlets proceed from the same fertile pen, all 
breathing detestation of Lord Palmerston, and 
of this unfortunate nation. Like all great men, 
Count Ficquelmont has a mission. He is the 
literary champion of the three great powers, and 
the mortal foe of England, and of constitutional 



INTRODUCTION. 5 

government. To do him justice, he likes no 
English statesman : though he nominally writes 
against Lord Palmerston, he certainly loves not 
Lord Aberdeen. He is systematic and con- 
sistent because it is England herself, and not 
so much any individual Englishman, that he 
heartily abominates. 

As an indication of the ideas entertained by a 
considerable number of official people on the 
Continent, this book deserves more attention in 
England than it has yet received. The first 
volume was perused with much curiosity ; but 
English politicians thought they had done enough 
by laughing at the absurdities it contained, and 
troubled themselves no further about Count 
Ficquelmont and his philosophy. This was a 
great mistake. Foolish as the book may appear 
to us, it is not therefore harmless. Because we 
see plainly the ignorance and prejudice of every 
page, we must not suppose that they are so 
obvious to the rest of the world. This work 
has been widely circulated and eagerly read. 
It has not only been studied by Frenchmen, 
Austrians, and Prussians, but in many instances 
implicitly believed ; and the advice Count Fic- 
quelmont gives has been systematically acted 
upon, by more than one minister of state at 

B 3 



b INTRODUCTION, 

Vienna and Berlin. In treating it with the con- 
tempt it deserves for its intrinsic value, we forgot 
that the individual who offered it was no mean 
personage. Once a follower of Prince Metternich, 
a late ambassador at the court of St. Peters- 
burgh, an ex- Secretary of State for Foreign 
Affairs, and the man who was lately spoken 
of as the probable successor of Count Buol again 
in the Foreign Office, Count Ficquelmont must 
be considered as a very eminent politician. He 
can neither be despised, nor forgotten, nor set 
aside. He is an enthusiast, and his enthusiasm 
is all directed against this country. 

The manner in which Englishmen have been 
treated in the Austrian dominions, the rancorous 
hatred which some Austrian politicans have pro- 
fessed to England, is no longer inexplicable. It 
was really stimulated by the Czar of Russia, 
for purposes which we can now sufficiently 
comprehend. This fluent author, with all his 
profound political metaphysics, is the dupe 
of Russian diplomatists. He believes he is pa- 
triotically writing in favour of Austria, while 
he is in reality playing the reckless game of the 
northern Autocrat. When the Eastern question 
had risen to such a tremendous magnitude, and 
all who had the interests of Austria most sin- 



INTRODUCTION. 7 

cerely at heart, saw clearly that her safety 
depended on the maintenance of European tran- 
quillity ; and when it was evident that had the 
German courts united closely with the Western 
powers, the peace of the world would, even at 
the close of the last year, have been preserved ; 
Count Ficquelmont suspended the third volume 
of his great work, and wrote a pamphlet entitled 
Le Cote Keligieux de la Question d' Orient, vio- 
lently abusing England, and counselling the sus- 
picious policy of inaction. No person can doubt 
that the prime source of the eloquent author's 
inspiration at that important crisis, was the 
astute potentate whose court Count Ficquelmont 
had long adorned, and for whom he professes 
such deep veneration.* 

* Though Count Ficquelmont entered public life under 
the auspices of Prince Metternich, and though it was by 
this statesman that the Count was sent as ambassador to 
Russia twenty-five years ago, it must not be imagined that 
Prince Metternich ever shared in this author's extravagant 
prejudices against England. There has been an Austrian 
minister, Prince Schwartzenberg, who went even as far as 
Count Ficquelmont in detestation of this country. But 
Metternich has never been the slave of such miserable anti- 
pathies. In 1828 he was very desirous of a close alliance 
with England ; and it was only after his efforts to discipline 
and combine Europe against Russia had failed, through the 

b 4 



8 INTRODUCTION. 

But the literary Count is a great philosopher. 
He considers himself a most scientific statesman. 
Not satisfied with the mere political routine of 
cabinets, he gives his readers a why and a 
wherefore for everything, and deals familiarly 
with the incomprehensible. At his touch even 
Lord Palmerston becomes an abstraction, an 
"incarnated word," and England a body that 
this word abuses. The respect for law and 
order habitually shown by Englishmen, is most 

ignorance and dishonesty of the courts of France and Prussia, 
that he sent Count Ficquelmont to St. Petersburgh to con- 
ciliate the Emperor Nicholas* It was then that this diplo- 
matist first became the passionate and furious enemy of 
England, which he has since shown himself to be. Singu- 
larly enough, G-eneral Krasinsky, in the interviews he had 
with Prince Metternich at that very time, was endeavouring 
to instil the same prejudice against England into the mind 
of the Austrian prime minister, with which the Czar, only 
too successfully, was inspiring the Austrian ambassador. 
" England," said the Russian emissary to Metternich, " would 
ruin all kinds of commerce in Europe ; her ministers are merely 
merchants decorated with ribbons." But what did the Chan- 
cellor of Austria reply ? " Oh," said he, " these are the old 
anti-Anglican prejudices of Napoleon." Such, indeed, they 
were; but they had been implicitly adopted by Nicholas, 
and were inculcated by himself and his agents in every 
court of the Continent. The Austrian empire can have no 
worse enemies than such shallow enthusiasts as Count Fic- 
quelmont. (Report of Count Krasinsky to the Emperor Ni- 
cholas, June 8th, 1829.) 



INTRODUCTION. V 

philosophically deduced from the plain fact of 
England being an island. It is, he tells his 
readers, owing to maritime discipline that we 
live in habits of obedience. The howling billows 
which break upon our shores, proclaim inces- 
santly that it is only by the principle of sub- 
mission we can become masters of the watery 
element which would otherwise keep us for ever 
prisoners in our island. Hence the greatness of 
England is inseparably associated with the spirit 
of loyalty; the mechanical obedience which every 
sailor pays to his captain's commands, is at the 
bottom of our respect for the law ; it is therefore 
simple, natural, innate. The doctrine of in- 
nate ideas which our great countryman Locke 
combats at the commencement of his " Essay on 
the Human Understanding," was not the mere 
product of the great metaphysician's brain. 
Those who have denied that such a doctrine 
was ever held by philosophers, must now ac- 
knowledge their error. We are ourselves living 
witnesses of the fact. An Austrian statesman 
holds that Englishmen have an innate principle 
of obedience in their breasts ; and that we plainly 
illustrated this extraordinary principle at the 
time of the Great Exhibition. 

The Crystal Palace occupies no inconsiderable 



19 INTRODUCTION. 

portion of Count Ficquelmont's first volume. A 
careful reader must see that the fairy structure 
was the cause of much of this author's indignant 
eloquence. He did us the honour of visiting 
England at that exciting season. His august 
form mingled with the crowds of sight seers, who 
sated their delighted eyes with the wonders of 
industry and art. As he mused on the objects 
before him, two dark spectres crossed his path 
and disturbed his pleasant dreams. These were 
Mazzini and Ledru Rollin, walking arm in arm 
about the galleries as comfortably as though 
there were no monarchical scaffolds in the world. 
Was it in human nature that this should be 
endured ? Count Ficquelmont's heart almost 
burst with indignation; his fingers itched to 
inflict summary chastisement on the two revolu- 
tionists and rebels. But he was obliged to 
restrain his emotions ; and from that moment lost 
all pleasure in visiting the Crystal Palace which 
Lord Palmerston had just christened the Temple 
of Peace. Count Ficquelmont never set his foot in 
it again. " A nice Temple of Peace indeed," he 
said sardonically, "in which such men are the 
worshippers!" He resolved to make a literary 
crusade against England ; and it must be ac- 
knowledged that he has faithfully kept his vow. 



INTRODUCTION. 1 1 

He has powerfully contributed to produce that 
violent antipathy to every thing English, and that 
absolute idolatry of every thing Russian, which is 
so prevalent among the Austrian aristocracy. 
Whatever may be the polite assurances of diplo- 
matists, it is certain that this deeply rooted 
aversion to England must have important poli- 
tical effects, and it is necessary to treat seriously 
this singular production of intellectual diplo- 
macy. 

William Wilberforce once remarked that 
England was too honest to have any permanent 
connection with the Continent. Count Ficquel- 
mont eminently illustrates that excellent man's 
observation ; for he cannot even suppose the pos- 
sibility of English disinterestedness. Not a 
single action of our statesmen is by him attributed 
to any motive but extreme selfishness. Those 
who gain their notions of political affairs from 
this book must believe that English ministers are 
monsters of perfidy, and the ministers of Russia, 
Austria, and Prussia, models of political morality. 
According to Count Ficquelmont, England is a 
wolf, and Austria a lamb. The Continent would 
be a heaven upon earth if England would but let 
it alone. Her want of principle, her falsehood, 
her recklessness, her disregard of law and justice, 



12 INTRODUCTION. 

have produced all the discontent and misery of 
Europe. 

The neglect of truth Count Ficquelmont con- 
siders the most remarkable characteristic of 
English politicians. He most acutely shows that 
this vice originates in our constitutional govern- 
ment. We are partisans from the cradle. Every 
Englishman is of a party, and carries about with 
him the secret of his party. He is always in the 
presence of his political opponents endeavouring 
to find out their secret and to keep his own. 
This habit of self-restraint naturally engenders 
duplicity. Our most eminent member of parlia- 
ment is the best dissembler. He is a general 
concealing his plan of the campaign and holding 
himself prepared for every manoeuvre. Thus, to 
the mind of the philosophical Count it plainly 
appears that this kind of habitual dissimulation 
gives its impress to the national character, forms 
the political morals of the country, and causes 
our political life to be nothing more than a 
perpetual intrigue. How then can it naturally 
be expected that an Englishman should have 
a different morality when dealing with other 
nations ? If we are false at home, we must be 
false abroad. 

And this is the wisdom of a statesman. This 



INTRODUCTION. 13 

is what a minister of Austria has learnt in the 
highest diplomatic stations. It is a man capable 
of drawing such conclusions and publishing them 
as the products of the highest wisdom whom 
courtiers and monarchs reverence, and who may 
once more guide the foreign affairs of a great 
empire in times of extraordinary difficulty, when 
one false step must inevitably bring about its 
dissolution. At the sight of such a pheno- 
menon we can only console ourselves with an 
apophthegm of antiquity, and say, that the gods 
first smite with madness those whom they de- 
vote to destruction. 

But we have, indeed, come to a pleasant state 
of things. England has fought the battles of 
the continental sovereigns, heartily struggled in 
their cause T subsidised their armies, spent with 
unexampled profusion her treasure and blood 
in order to maintain them on their thrones; 
allowed herself to be abandoned and betrayed 
by them, and again by them to be abandoned and 
betrayed ; loaded her own shoulders with a debt 
which almost staggers credibility; when peace 
was brought about, generously stipulated for 
no advantage of her own, and even allowed 
herself to be considered an accomplice in crimes 
from which she received no benefit; and the 



14 INTRODUCTION. 

result is, that she is branded as the most per- 
fidious of traitors, and as the most unscrupulous 
of all nations ; that she is at length obliged to 
form a close alliance with her old enemy, in 
order to protect herself from the hostility of her 
ancient allies who owe their crowns to her tre- 
mendous exertions, her unparalleled fortitude, 
her unprecedented public spirit. From this we 
may at least learn the harsh wisdom inculcated 
by experience. Now, when the British Temple 
of Janus is once more opened, the curtain rising 
on another exciting drama, our flag floating in 
the Baltic and the Black Seas, and our soldiers 
marshalling for combat on far- distant shores ; 
now, when Englishmen may be called upon to 
endure sacrifices of which they may yet little 
dream ; when the map of Europe is spread out, 
and many of the present demarcations of states 
may be effaced, it is not unworthy of our con- 
sideration how our former favours have been 
received by those who have been the object of 
them, how deeply fervent are their grateful be- 
nedictions, how faithfully they have kept their 
engagements, how deserving they are of the 
heavy mortgages we have made of our revenues 
for their benefit. 

It becomes a duty for us to ponder on the 



INTRODUCTION. 15 

history of the last forty years. A new era has 
begun : a strange future dawns upon us. The 
important transactions in which our diplomatists 
and statesmen have been engaged during this 
century, which must be regarded as one great 
chapter in universal history, may very fitly be 
reviewed. In the period extending from the 
Battle of Waterloo to the commencement of 
European hostilities at the present moment, our 
statesmen may have committed many errors; 
they may have been guilty both of imprudent 
neglect and imprudent intervention ; they may 
have trusted too much to the professions of 
others ; they may have supposed that their con- 
temporaries were as sincere, as disinterested, as 
magnanimous, and as ardently desirous of the 
welfare of mankind as they themselves have 
been ; but without prejudging the points at 
issue, it may be confidently asserted, that no 
candid person after a fair interpretation of 
motives, and a just consideration of the diffi- 
culties against which our ministers have had to 
contend, will venture to pronounce a verdict of 
which Englishmen have in their national cha- 
racter any reason to be ashamed. 

With due deference to Count Ficquelmont, 
and to some politicians even in this country, 



1 6 INTRODUCTION. 

it may well be questioned whether our most 
serious mistakes have really proceeded from too 
much meddling with the affairs of the Continent. 
Our greatest errors may have rather been from 
too much indifference. We may have too fre- 
quently been the mechanical tools of continental 
politicians ; and their present dislike of our 
country may arise from the fact that we are 
determined to be their mechanical tools no 
longer. Where statesmen once led, they are 
now obliged to follow. The mind of this nation 
is becoming every day more and more enlight- 
ened ; every day the people are growing more 
and more sensible of the immense debt they owe 
to humanity. That debt must be paid. We are 
not now to be terrified by the bugbears of inter- 
vention and revolution ; for we see clearly, 
that there are great powers, whose policy is a 
systematic intermeddling with smaller states, 
and that the most complete despots are the 
most reckless revolutionists. Is it for them to 
upbraid us with our unprincipled interventions ? 
Such a reproach comes somewhat strangely from 
the mouth of an Austrian politician. No nation 
has carried the principle of intervention to such 
an extent as Austria ; she is not satisfied with 
offering advice ; she is not satisfied with threat- 



INTRODUCTION. 17 

ening ; she is ever throwing her sword into the 
scale, in her dealing with the small states of the 
Italian peninsula. Her policy is a mere armed 
intervention : she decides all her disputes by the 
hand of power. 

There is a wide difference between the moral 
influence of England and the unscrupulous mili- 
tary occupations of the Continental Powers. The 
admonitions which English statesmen have from 
time to time given to our humbler allies, have 
not been interested. It is from no selfish regard 
to the interests of England, but from a desire to 
see more attention paid to the dictates of justice 
and mercy, that our ministers have expressed 
their sentiments. Such advice is, of course, 
odious to those who pride themselves in making 
the will of the sovereign the only law of govern- 
ment. It is natural that these two opposite 
principles should clash. As long as the state of 
the Continent is as it is, and England remains 
as she is, it is idle to suppose that this country 
can ever be a pleasing object of contemplation 
to governments that were once supposed to be 
our cordial allies. The very existence of Eng- 
land is an intervention with arbitrary power. 
This influence cannot be destroyed, except by 
sinking our island beneath the seas that roll 



18 INTRODUCTION. 

around us. It does not depend on our states- 
men, nor on the mere form of our government. 
A country enjoying the blessings of peace, law, 
order, and liberty, must ever have a greater 
weight in the nations of the world than one 
distracted by civil war, oppressed by the armed 
heel of tyranny, and regarding its rulers as its 
greatest enemies ; a country possessing bound- 
less wealth, mighty resources, and an overflow- 
ing commerce, must naturally be superior to one 
full of bankruptcy, discontent, and ruin. It is 
the triumph of freedom over despotism, riches 
over poverty, justice over injustice. 

Nor is this the first time that it has been the 
peculiar blessing of England to be called by the 
infinite wisdom of Providence, in times of dark- 
ness and disorder, to exert the same beneficent 
influence on the civilisation of the world. Nor 
is this the first time that unscrupulous rulers 
have reaped what they have sown, and then 
have blamed the seasons and nature, and every- 
thing but themselves. Man is now what he has 
always been ; and the operations of cause and 
effect are just what they ever were. If we 
would see the seed time of the present discon- 
tents, anarchy, and military usurpations, we 
must examine the deeds of the Congress of 



INTRODUCTION. 19 

Vienna. If we would see the results of inter- 
vention, and of non-intervention, we must cast 
a rapid glance at the history of the last two 
centuries. Then the way will be clear to follow 
with precision the march of events during this 
generation. An ancient moral will assume a 
new form. Great truths are ever old ; delusive 
paradoxes only are new. 



c 2 



20 FOREIGN POLICY. 



CHAPTER I. 



A HISTORICAL RETROSPECT. — FOREIGN POLICY OF ELIZA- 
BETH AND OF CROMWELL. FIRST AND SECOND PARTITIONS 

OF POLAND THE STRUGGLE AGAINST NAPOLEON. 



We have before now had an enemy making 
use of fanaticism as an ally, declaring him- 
self the champion of the orthodox faith, and 
endeavouring by this means to grasp at uni- 
versal dominion. It may be well for us to re- 
member how our ancestors have acted in times 
much more dangerous than ours, and when they 
faced a despot much more formidable. A direct 
attack was made on their national independence; 
the conquest of England was openly attempted; 
the means of resistance were not a twentieth 
part of what they are at this day. Then, as 
now, Europe was torn by dissensions ; then, as 
now, England was ruled by a female sovereign. 

We are still proud of the reign of Elizabeth ; 
the hearts of Englishmen throb when they re- 
member their virgin Queen. The foreign policy 



FOREIGN POLICY OF ELIZABETH. 21 

of her long reign was the wisest, the most glo- 
rious, the most triumphant in the whole range 
of the English annals. It ought ever to be held 
in remembrance by our statesmen ; it deserves 
especially the attention of those who set them- 
selves resolutely to preach the doctrine of non- 
intervention. Never before was the name of 
England so much respected, never was her in- 
fluence so great abroad, never did she place 
herself so gallantly between the tyrant and his 
prey. Nor was this policy adopted through any 
romantic notions. It was the simple law of 
self-preservation. Our great princess wisely 
saw that her own glory, and even the existence 
of her kingdom, were inseparably associated 
with the prosperity of all Protestant states who 
were endangered by the intrigues and the arms 
of Philip the Second. 

It requires little imagination to find a certain 
resemblance between the Spanish Emperor who 
was the enemy of Queen Elizabeth, and the 
Kussian Emperor who is now the enemy of 
Queen Victoria. Philip the Second was a consum- 
mate hypocrite, and his hypocrisy was disguised 
under the appearance of a zeal for orthodoxy. 
No power could trust to his professions. He 
prided himself on using for his purposes his 
credulous admirers, who supposed that the reli- 

c 3 



22 FOREIGN POLICY. 

gious maxims which were ever on his lips must 
have some effect on his conduct. Europe was 
in his day divided into two great parties ; the one 
struggling for religious freedom , and the other 
fanatically bent on keeping all the world under 
its dominion. By assuming the leadership of 
the Roman Catholic party, Philip made every 
enthusiastic devotee of the ancient faith a poli- 
tical instrument by which he endeavoured to 
overturn the thrones of his neighbours, and 
extend his own authority. 

England was placed in direct antagonism to 
Spain. The wise statesmen who surrounded 
the English throne were not afraid of being 
called revolutionists and agitators ; they pro- 
ceeded systematically to support their religious 
brethren in every part of Europe. In the 
Netherlands, in Scotland, in France, wherever 
people were resisting oppression, or conscien- 
tiously struggling for their religious liberties, 
the protecting hand of England was seen. Such 
calm wisdom, united with such determined 
energy, is unexampled in our history. The 
achievements of Burleigh and his grave col- 
leagues dwarf all the diplomatic feats which 
have ever received the applause of parliaments. 
England knew how to do good and avoid evil, 
how to hold her own amid all the convulsions of 



FOREIGN POLICY OP ELIZABETH. 23 

that distracted time. Parsimonious and cau- 
tious as Elizabeth was by disposition, at a great 
conjuncture she rose to a height of moral 
heroism which to the degenerate politicians of 
later ages must seem incredible. 

Her conduct, when the sovereignty of the 
Low Countries was offered to her, admirably 
illustrates her foreign policy. Her ablest minis- 
ters trembled ; she was warned not to succour 
rebels; the cause of all sovereigns was repre- 
sented to her as being the same ; a holy alliance 
was by some considered advisable. Ireland was 
in a worse condition than even in 1797. The 
English were a divided nation. The fleet was in- 
significant, and there was no regular army. An 
attempt to succour the Flemings was certain to 
involve Elizabeth in immediate hostilities with 
the mighty power of Philip. Having carefully 
calculated all the consequences, she decided on 
rejecting the allegiance of the Flemings, but 
also on giving them at once assistance. The 
effect of this magnanimous resolution is well 
known. Philip was braved, his Armada de- 
stroyed, and Holland called into existence. 
When the balance of power was again disturbed 
by another overbearing monarch, the Dutch were 
our most faithful allies ; they gave to us a sove- 
reign whose genius for foreign policy was only 

c 4 



24 FOREIGN POLICY. 

inferior to that of Elizabeth ; and England rose 
to be the first power in the world. This 
was the fruit of that generous policy which 
took for its basis the principle of intervention. 
The result was entirely beneficial: by protecting 
others, we secured the greatness of ourselves ; 
we felt that every power was interested in the 
great battle for religious liberty ; and that 
England had an illustrious duty to perform 
in the great commonwealth of nations. What 
would have been the eifect of an opposite 
policy? Had Philip been allowed to give the 
law to Europe, had the brave Flemings been 
subdued, and the Roman Catholic religion firmly 
established in Spain, France, and the Low 
Countries, the next step would have been to 
invade Scotland and Ireland. What would then 
have become of the civil and religious freedom 
of England ? 

It has been ably shown, that the warfare 
between Protestantism and Catholicism in the 
sixteenth century has now taken another form, 
and is seen in the conflict between consti- 
tutionalism and absolutism. This analogy was 
first pointed out by Burke ; it was carried still 
further by Sir James Mackintosh, and it has 
been eloquently illustrated by Mr. Macaulay. 
The spirit of the two eras is essentially the 



FOREIGN POLICY OF ELIZABETH. 25 

same. The social condition of France is not 
unlike what it was in the age of Henry the 
Fourth ; and it will be well for that gallant 
nation, if some portion of the spirit of the glorious 
Prince of Navarre shall be displayed in the per- 
son of her present ruler. The English alliance 
was of the greatest benefit to the French nation 
when it was slowly recovering from that dis- 
astrous civil war which had so long laid the 
country desolate. The English alliance may now 
be of the greatest benefit to the French nation as 
it is breathing from the long struggle between 
political factions which have made a constitutional 
government almost impossible. Because Henry 
the Fourth was faithful to Queen Elizabeth, he 
saw himself securely seated on the throne. If 
the Emperor Louis JNiapoleon be faithful to 
Queen Victoria, he may transmit his empire to 
his descendants, reconcile the friends of liberty 
to his administration, unite the glories of his 
uncle with the virtues of Henry the Fourth, and 
leave a name more illustrious than that of any 
conqueror or any hereditary sovereign. That 
France became prosperous, that Henry the Fourth 
triumphed over all his difficulties, was due in a 
great measure to Elizabeth, and her spirited in- 
tervention. She gave her money readily to her 
French ally ; and, sparing as she was of the blood 



26 FOREIGN POLICY. 

of her subjects, she willingly equipped English 
battalions in his cause. This was true policy, as 
all wise intervention must be. As Henry grew 
powerful, Elizabeth's inveterate enemy Philip of 
Spain gradually grew weaker, and Holland rose 
into importance. The Queen was not, however, 
satisfied with merely giving liberty to the Dutch, 
or of vanquishing her proud and haughty 
antagonist. She was wise and circumspect; 
and anxiously wished to unite all the seventeen 
provinces of the Netherlands into a powerful 
republic, that might have been a rampart to 
the ambition of both Spain and France. Before 
this noble design could be matured, our great 
princess died ; and with her departed her lofty 
policy, and much of the English glory. 

The two princes of the House of Stuart, who 
succeeded Elizabeth, had neither her generous 
patriotism nor magnanimity. It was not from 
a succession of favourites like Somerset and 
Buckingham that a wise and dignified foreign 
policy could be expected. As soon as the nations 
ceased to fear, they began to despise, the name of 
England ; and from the time of Elizabeth to the 
time of William the Third, our kings were only 
in name English sovereigns. The foreign policy 
of the great Protector is now a hackneyed theme 
of eulogy. It is indeed surprising to see with 



FOREIGN POLICY OE CROMWELL. 27 

how little trouble our country rose from the state 
of imbecility into which it had fallen, to be again 
regarded as the foremost European power. This 
latent force is always inherent in the nation ; all 
that is ever necessary is the spirit to call it forth, 
and the hand to wield it. It is only requisite for 
an English king to respect himself, that he may 
be respected throughout the world. The two 
first Georges had neither the genius of Elizabeth, 
of Cromwell, nor of William the Third ; but they 
knew how to assert their dignity ; and the country 
never again sank into the former state of 
weakness which seemed natural to it while the 
Stuarts were on the throne. The fact is un- 
deniable that every sovereign in our history of 
whom we are proud, has firmly and courageously 
administered the foreign policy of the country. 

When George the Third came to the throne he 
resolved to be peaceful and conciliating. The 
old system of foreign policy was abandoned, and 
the consequences soon began to develope them- 
selves. The greatest crime in modern history 
was perpetrated, and from the effect *of that 
crime we and all Europe are still suffering. It 
would not be difficult to show that most of the 
wretchedness and turbulence of this generation, 
the formidable aggrandisement of Russia, and 
all the evils we are now called upon to resist, 



28 FOREIGN POLICY. 

sprung from the first partition of Poland in 1772. 
Our ministers ought never to be forgiven for 
their culpable blindness and apathy while that 
iniquity was in progress. The sins of the fathers 
have indeed been visited upon the children. We 
should not now with France be at war in 
defence of Turkey, had we wisely intervened 
with France in defence of Poland seventy- eight 
3^ears ago. The peace of the world might have 
been preserved, the principles of public law 
might have been asserted, and the American 
war might have been avoided, by opposing with 
resolution that shameful spoliation of the oldest 
European nation. 

"We have seen the consequences of intervention, 
and we may now look around and see the conse- 
quences of non-intervention. The most bitter 
thought attending the consciousness of our 
neglect is that we did not err from ignorance. 
The inevitable disasters which have resulted from 
that enormity were all foretold. In the Annual 
Register for that very year 1772, a most im- 
pressive warning came from the pen of Edmund 
Burke; and it is melancholy to contrast his 
earnest and emphatic language with the feeble 
sentences of the King's speech on the meeting of 
Parliament. * The ministers in their profound 

* Nineteen years after the first partition of Poland, 



FIRST PARTITION OE POLAND. 29 

wisdom deemed the partition of Poland unworthy 
of notice in the address from the throne. With 
this indifference so plainly exemplified, it is 
astonishing to find Count Ficquelmont gravely 
accusing us of having been the principal cause 
of that partition. We are acting now, he says, to 
Turkey, as we formerly acted to Poland, and 
England, not Kussia, will subvert the Turkish 
Empire. The manner in which this extraor- 
dinary assertion is made out is curious. 

The interests of the Greek religionists was the 
plea of the Empress Catherine for the first occu- 
pation, and the subsequent partition, of Poland; 
just as the Emperor Nicholas has under the same 
pretences interfered in the affairs of Turkey, and 
endeavoured to bring about its overthrow. The 
tactics are precisely similar ; and it says little for 
the sagacity of diplomatists, that the second ma- 
Burke still firmly repeated his emphatic condemnation of 
that infamous deed. He said, that weak and careless as the 
French ministry was in the last days of Louis the Fifteenth, 
he had peculiar means of knowing that had our government 
been prepared, in 1772, to interpose in order to prevent the 
partition of Poland, France would have united with England 
in the cause. There is, then, no excuse for the English 
Cabinet. Burke visited France immediately after the con- 
summation of this iniquity, and spoke of what he had 
personally learned in mixing with French politicians of 
every description, and from conversing with the French 
ministers. 



30 FOREIGN POLICY. 

nceuvre has nearly been as successful as the first. 
In the last century, the great majority of the 
Poles were Roman Catholics, and it cannot be 
denied that for a long while they had grievously 
oppressed their fellow-countrymen, who, under 
the name of Dissidents, had, by express stipu- 
lation, a right to every privilege of free citizens. 
The injured Poles formed themselves into con- 
federacies, and after the diet of 1764, in which 
the Roman Catholic majority, more outrageously 
than ever, violated the treaty of Oliva, they 
asked for the mediation of the powers who 
guaranteed that arrangement. The ambassadors 
of Russia, Prussia, and Sweden, presented me- 
morials in their favour ; and because England 
did the same, Count Ficquelmont accuses this 
country of having really been the cause of the 
nefarious proceedings of the sovereigns who 
afterwards divided Poland. The logic of this is 
truly wonderful. England was bound to pro- 
test against the violation of that treaty when 
directly appealed to, by those in whose interest 
some of its important provisions were made. 
But what connection the mild and judicious 
memorial of our minister, Mr. Wroughton, had 
with that shocking outrage of all law and justice 
six years afterwards, it is impossible to imagine. 
All that England can be blamed for, is that she 



FIRST PARTITION OF POLAND. 31 

supposed Russia and Prussia really were sincere 
in their remonstrances, and believed them to 
have had the interests of the Dissidents at heart. 
But the fact is, Frederic and Catherine cared 
nothing for Greeks, Calvinists, or Lutherans. 
The welfare of the religionists was a mere 
pretence ; what these sovereigns wanted, as the 
event clearly showed, was political power. The 
Russian troops surrounded Warsaw ; resolu- 
tions were dictated by the Russian ambassadors, 
and transmitted to Moscow for the approval of 
the Empress. Thus the influence of Russia 
became firmly established ; her armies inter- 
sected the country, and measures were gra- 
dually taken for facilitating the direct blow 
which was about to be struck at the national 
existence of Poland. 

It is certainly true, as Count Ficquelmont 
alleges, that Austria was not the principal agent 
in the first partition. There can be no doubt, 
that on this occasion, as on others, she was 
compelled by her two powerful neighbours to 
become the participator in their crimes. Austria 
has always been the reluctant assistant in the 
designs of Russian aggrandisement. But this by 
no means renders her conduct justifiable, or even 
excusable. All who shared in the spoils of the 
partition must bear their portion of the guilt. 



32 FOREIGN POLICY. 

The manner in which Austria acted, was per- 
haps the worst of the three confederates in evil. 
For she professed to be the friend of Poland ; it 
was under the mask of friendship that she occu- 
pied those provinces ; and a very short while 
before the act of partition was declared, the 
Empress Queen wrote letters to the King of 
Poland, full of friendly assurances, and the most 
solemn promises never to rob him of any of his 
dominions. Frederic and Catherine might be 
considered open foes, but the blackness of 
Austria was doubly dyed ; for she was trea- 
cherous and cowardly. She saw well the con- 
sequences of the deed. She knew that what- 
ever might be her present gain, she was certain 
of ultimate loss ; for Poland was the natural, and 
might have been the insurmountable, barrier of 
Germany against Russia, and when that was 
removed, the way was clear for the despot of 
the North to advance his legions to the banks of 
the Rhine. What made the folly of Austria 
still more apparent, was that the designs of the 
Russians upon Turkey were at that time publicly 
avowed, and the weakness of the Ottoman Em- 
pire plainly demonstrated. It was during that 
very year, while Catherine was dictating terms 
to Turkey, grasping at the Crimea and at the 
absolute control of the Black Sea, that Austria 



SECOND PARTITION OF POLAND. 33 

submitted to assist her in partitioning Poland. 
No policy was ever more infatuated. And can 
Count Ficquelmont think, that because the first 
design of the partition did not come from the 
Court of Vienna, that his country is absolved 
from the guilt in which she participated, and by 
which, while seemingly acquiring additional ter- 
ritories, she lost so much positive strength ? In 
this case, as in others, indeed, where Russia has 
been concerned, Austria has frequently erred, not 
so much from a desire of doing wrong, as from 
a fear of doing right. Russia and Prussia have 
generally joined together; and then Austria has 
been dragged with them. This was seen at the 
first partition of Poland ; it was seen as clearly 
at the second ; it was seen still more openly at 
the Congress of Vienna. 

The second partition of Poland was even more 
shameless than the first, for it was made, as the 
present attack on Turkey has been made, for the 
express purpose of preventing reform. King 
Stanislaus Augustus had just given the Poles a 
constitution, which Burke has immortalised in 
his Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs. 
The most violent abuses had been remedied ; 
order established ; the exorbitant privileges of 
the nobles abandoned ; legislatorial chambers 
instituted ; a fair prospect, such as made Burke 

D 



34 FOREIGN POLICY. 

exult for the future of Poland, seemed dawning. 
And what was the consequence ? The rapacity 
and jealousy of Russia were roused, and at the 
very moment when the crowned heads affected 
such horror of the atrocious deeds of the French 
republicans, a new treaty of partition was signed. 
Six weeks after they had virtually dethroned the 
King of Poland, interfered with his legal rights, 
and occupied his territories, the famous procla- 
mation of the Duke of Brunswick was issued, in 
which he asserted that the pious allies were in 
march to arrest the strokes levelled at the throne 
of France, to subdue the excesses of faction, and 
to restore legitimate authority. It was natural 
that such a declaration should have been con- 
sidered hypocritical. It was natural that the 
allied sovereigns should have been suspected of 
meditating the partition of France. Such an 
alliance could not be expected to prosper: its 
failure was inevitable. The humiliation of 
Prussia, the defeat of her armies, and her pu- 
sillanimous desertion of what she represented as 
the cause of sovereigns, were the consequences 
of her conduct to unhappy Poland. 

There was no pretence of the interests of the 
Greek subjects of King Stanislaus Augustus 
being attacked, when this second outrage was 
committed. These blasphemous vindicators of 



SECOND PARTITION OF POLAND. 35 

monarchical authority kept no terms with the 
rest of mankind. Their interference was ex- 
pressly to subvert a constitution ; thus the 
struggle between despots and constitutions had 
already began. Catherine of Russia placed her- 
self at the head of the absolutism of Europe, and 
was then as ever firmly seconded by her faithful 
ally, Frederic William of Prussia. At this 
time, as in 1772, the Russians were decidedly 
victorious over Turkey. The fate of the Otto- 
man Empire was then in the balance, and for 
the first time we behold the English ministry 
awakened to the necessity of rescuing Constan- 
tinople from the hands of Russia. Mr. Pitt 
stirred up the old jealousy between Austria and 
Prussia, and by his interposition the triumphant 
legions were stopped in their victorious march. 
But Mr. Pitt did not discern the intimate con- 
nection that there has ever been between Turkey 
and Poland. He did not see that it was useless 
to stop the advance of Russia in the south, if 
she were allowed to proceed unimpeded in the 
west. He did not see that to rescue Turkey, it 
was necessary to save Poland. All the calam- 
ities of this century might have been avoided, 
had there been a powerful constitutional mon- 
archy at Warsaw, relying for its independence, 
not on treaties, but on the impetuous blood of 

D 2 



36 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Sarmatia. And such there might have been. 
The materials were abundant, they were even 
taking the form of vitality, when the unscru- 
pulous hand of Catherine rent them asunder, 
and she gorged her voracious appetite with the 
remains. The hour of the dismemberment of 
Turkey has been that of the dismemberment of 
Poland. As they have fallen together, so ought 
they to rise together. 

We yet feel the effect of Mr. Pitt's great 
error. He thought the continental sovereigns 
as disinterested as England in their inten- 
tions on taking up arms. The consequences 
were soon seen. England had scarcely aban- 
doned her neutrality, her troops had not yet 
joined the allied powers, when Prussia began to 
make terms for herself with France, and her 
armies were weakened on the Rhine, that she 
might get her full share of the spoils on the 
Vistula. The war against revolutionary France 
never was a war of alliance. England was the 
only power heartily earnest in the cause. Prus- 
sia, Russia, and Austria had each selfish objects 
to attain ; instead of avenging the crimes of 
Robespierre and Danton, they were intent on 
committing crimes of their own. While they 
were reprobating the annexation of Avignon 
and the two cities of the Comptat to the French 



STKtJGGLE AGAINST NAPOLEON. 37 

territories, two of them were eager to annex a 
great kingdom to their own dominions ; and the 
other, therefore, resolved to indemnify herself 
by adding the places taken during the war, to 
her empire. The truth cannot be denied: 
the monarch s were as bad as the republicans ; 
hence the miseries of Europe ; hence the blood- 
shed, the follies, the crimes of three generations. 
The lax political morality was indeed epidemical. 
Napoleon was certainly not worse than Cathe- 
rine, Frederic William, or Leopold, It is im- 
possible for Englishmen to sympathise with the 
heartlessness of the sovereigns with whom it 
was the misfortune of this country to be allied. 
They were always ready to join France in those 
rapacious actions which we have been taught to 
abominate. The secularisation, or in reality, 
the confiscation, of the ecclesiastical states of 
Germany, was as shameful an action as any that 
the most inveterate enemies of kings ever com- 
mitted. This was the work of Prussia. The 
most atrocious of Napoleon's deeds was his 
treachery to Venice, and the division of her 
possessions. This was perpetrated in conjunc- 
tion with Austria, who thus acquired the power 
of oppression in Italy, which has been so well 
exercised even up to the present day. Who can 
regret the disasters of Jena and Austerlitz ? 

D 3 



38 FOREIGN POLICY. 

We can but be indignant that England was ever 
the abused ally of such unprincipled powers, 
and admire at least the abilities of our most 
determined foe. However great were the sacri- 
fices England made, however enormous was the 
wealth which she threw broadcast over the Con- 
tinent, the sovereigns of Europe acted almost 
invariably as though no such thing as a reci- 
procal obligation could ever exist. Such has 
been the treatment which this country has ever 
received from the governments which arrogate 
to themselves the exclusive title of the Three 
Great Powers. 

The grief and disappointment of Burke when 
he saw in what the alliance his eloquence had so 
powerfully excited was terminating, is well 
known. His bitter irony against the allies is as 
frequent as his energetic declamation against the 
republicans. He saw the future that was im- 
pending over Europe. He saw that the madness 
of governments was as bad as the recklessness 
of the Jacobins. His last years were saddened, 
because he was convinced that he had thought 
better of kings and emperors than they de- 
served, and the consciousness of the terrible 
chastisement they would receive, haunted his 
last hours. Such was the end of all those 
bright hopes, those eloquent and ardent pic- 



STRUGGLE AGAINST NAPOLEON. 39 

tures of society, that lofty and comprehensive 
wisdom which so highly distinguished this great 
man. He was right even when his views 
seemed most erroneous. Had there been any 
real virtue in the courts to which he appealed, 
Europe might have been saved, and a great 
constitutional monarchy established in France, 
before all the traditions of ancient glory had 
been forgotten, and all loyalty to the Bourbon 
dynasty hopelessly extinguished. As it was, 
the allied sovereigns were never truly respected 
by Frenchmen, because it was clearly seen that 
what they wanted to set up in that illustrious 
nation, was a viceroy of their own. The re- 
storation of a Bourbon dynasty looking for 
support, not to France but to Eussia, Austria, 
and Prussia, was an impossibility. But this 
was what was projected, and it consequently 
failed. 

The armies of the despotic monarchs never 
conquered the French emperor. It was the 
patriotism, the nationality of the multitude 
which on being at length roused, drove Napoleon 
from his throne, and trampled the tricolor in the 
dust. It must be confessed that if Napoleon 
overran Europe, if he dictated terms to every 
continental state, if he violated the laws of 
nature and of nations, the crimes imputed to 

D 4 



40 FOREIGN POLICY. 

him were shared by at least three of his great 
antagonists. They made him powerful; they 
made him an emperor ; and had it depended only 
upon them, he might have been a powerful 
emperor still. 

"We now know that all the appeals to pa- 
triotism and nationality, made by the allies when 
they commenced their final struggle against the 
French emperor, were as insincere as that devo- 
tion to the cause of religion and order, so loudly 
professed in their former manifestoes against the 
French republic. Like the unfortunate Margaret 
of Anjou in Shakspeare's Kichard the Third, or 
like the Fates in Greek tragedy, the figure of 
Poland cannot, by any artifice or crime, be pre- 
vented from disturbing the visions of power and 
dominion in which the tyrants of modern 
Europe would indulge ; and the spectre of a 
noble nation cowardly murdered haunts them to 
their doom. We may well tremble when we 
look back through so many stormy years, and 
trace the terrible evils which have sprung from 
that great public crime ; and on seeing the 
retributive punishment which impends over the 
titled descendants of those who perpetrated that 
iniquity, we may humbly and piously recognise 
the justice of Heaven. 



STRUGGLE AGAINST NAPOLEON. 41 

As it was the desire to share in the spoils of 
Poland which first neutralised the forces of the 
monarch s who fought against the republic of 
France; so it was the question of Poland 
which nearly made Russia, Prussia, and Austria 
disagree while the Congress of Vienna was 
sitting, and which certainly prevented that paci- 
fication of Europe from having any prospect of 
permanence. How little adversity had taught 
wisdom to the allies may be seen from one sig- 
nificant fact : even before Napoleon had been 
vanquished, and while the fortune of war was 
still doubtful, a secret treaty was signed at 
Keichenbach between the three Powers by which 
Poland was divided into three equal parts. Bat 
at the Congress of Vienna, it appeared that even 
the proverbial honesty which freebooters are not 
shameless enough to disregard when they share 
the produce of their knavery, did not influence 
the sovereigns of Russia and Prussia, who de- 
liberately violated their solemn engagement to 
Austria, and set the treaty at nought. As it 
was in the beginning, so it was to the end. 



42 FOREIGN POLICY. 



CHAP. II. 

THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 

The conduct of the champions of order and 
legality at the Congress of Vienna was as selfish 
and unscrupulous as the worst actions of Napo- 
leon. On whichever side of the map of Europe 
we may cast our eyes, we shall find reason for 
amazement at the work of diplomatic wisdom 
commenced at Vienna in 1814. The great con- 
queror had been overthrown, legitimacy had at 
length triumphed, and it was now to be seen 
how the rights of established governments were 
to be vindicated. 

One great principle, and only one, can be dis- 
cerned in all the labours of monarchs and their 
plenipotentiaries at that memorable epoch. It 
was distinctly proclaimed that might was omni- 
potent over right ; that all international law was 
abrogated ; that the weaker states of Europe 
were abandoned to the mercy of their stronger 
neighbours. Monarchical selfishness here reached 
its climax ; an impassible barrier between go- 
vernments and their subjects was established; 



THE CONGRESS OE VIENNA. 43 

they were understood to have no common in- 
terest, no common right. The most important 
stipulations of the Congress were dictated at the 
point of the sword by those very sovereigns who 
had so severely suffered by the sword, and 
henceforth it was the sword, and the sword only, 
that was to govern. Nothing could be plainer. 
Even the proprieties of deliberation were not 
maintained ; the great men who met in Congress 
thought themselves so far above the rest of man- 
kind that they would not even condescend to be 
hypocrites. When the Emperor Alexander in- 
sisted, in opposition to Austria and England, on 
appropriating almost the whole of Poland, what 
reason did he give ? "I have three hundred 
thousand men under arms," he said; and this 
proved, especially when he was supported by his 
good friend the King of Prussia, to be a most 
weighty and sufficient reason. After this, could 
it be affirmed with truth that Europe had reco- 
vered its freedom ? Who could rejoice at the 
overthrow of the military tyrant who was at least 
a hero and a genius ? 

Eussia did not drive Napoleon from his throne ; 
nor ought she to have been permitted to take 
the lion's share of his spoils. There was much 
talk of gratitude for the deliverance of Europe ; 
but there was no gratitude due to the Cossack. 
In the darkest hour of modern Europe, when 



44 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Austria and Prussia were both subjugated, and 
England alone, with that dogged obstinacy which 
is so characteristic of the nation, carried on the 
war, the patriotic Czar was ready to take from 
Prussia and Austria their acquisitions in Poland. 
At that terrible moment Russia was the humble 
ally of France ; and only roused herself to resist 
the French Emperor when it became evident 
that he was bent on dragging her to his foot- 
stool. Even then it was not Russia, but Nature 
and the treachery of his allies, that defeated the 
conqueror of the world. At the commencement 
of the French revolutionary war Catherine broke 
the strength of the alliance by her designs on 
Poland, and was the cause of their subsequent 
misfortunes. And, again in the last tremendous 
conflict on the plains of Waterloo, the Russian 
legions were far away when the fate of Europe 
was decided. 

But it is certain that gratitude to Russia was 
the cant of ambassadors at the Congress of 
Vienna; yet she obtained nothing from grati- 
tude ; all that she acquired was by force. For 
the spoils of Saxony the King of Prussia sup- 
ported the claims of Alexander ; thus the 
Russian power was established beyond the Vis- 
tula, and the independence of Continental Europe 
was but a name. To every man capable of re- 
flection, to every man who could take long views, 



THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 45 

it was as certain as any mathematical demon- 
stration that this settlement was only momentary. 
The seeds of worse evils were sown by the state 
physicians who had undertaken to cure the fear- 
ful malady which had so long convulsed society. 
If one potentate more than another was vitally 
interested in resisting the claims of Russia to 
the grand duchy of Warsaw, it was that so- 
vereign who supported them. The King of 
Prussia was really laying his own dominions 
open to the Czar, and through them all Germany, 
by supporting Alexander's pretensions. From 
that moment the House of Hohenzollern be- 
came the vassal of the Romanoffs. Of all coun- 
tries Prussia is the most completely destitute 
of natural defences. Whenever hostilities com- 
mence on the side of France, her provinces on 
the left bank of the Rhine must fall into the 
power of an invader. When she is threatened 
on the side of Russia, her territory on the right 
bank of the Vistula must suffer the same fate. 
Even in a time of peace, Konigsberg belongs 
in fact more to Russia than to herself. But 
when the Muscovite dominion was fully esta- 
blished at Warsaw and extended as far as Kalisch, 
the strong line of natural defence formed by the 
Vistula was completely broken. Thus Prussia 
being left absolutely defenceless, is ever compelled 



46 FOREIGN POLICY. 

to keep an immense army on a war footing ; 
other powers follow her example, and a heavy 
draw on the resources of the Continental States 
is by this means maintained. Though Berlin is 
situated between the Elbe and the Oder, it is only 
below Breslau that the Oder gC :ts any obstacle 
to an invader, and the capital of a great monar- 
chy is almost at the mercy of an enemy from the 
East. 

If the dictates of justice were to be disregarded, 
if nothing but temporary expediency was to 
prevail, if Poland was for ever to be extin- 
guished as a nation, it would have been far better 
for Prussia to have possessed that ancient re- 
public than Russia ; for by that means the in- 
fluence of the Czar over Western Europe might 
have been securely barred. But such conside- 
rations were neglected ; Europe was to be de- 
livered, and France and England were to evince 
their gratitude to Russia in the manner we now 
witness. 

It would seem that the Germans, with their 
blind confidence in the Czar, never ima- 
gined that the day might come when he would 
be their enemy. Austria is almost as defence- 
less in her frontier as Prussia. Olmutz in 
Moravia, and Leopoldstadt in Hungary, are the 
first fortified places on which an Austrian army 



THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 47 

can fall back, in the event of hostilities with 
Kussia. The natural defences indeed, such as the 
strong mountain range which seems to protect 
the heart of the Austrian empire, might be 
an irresistible rampart, when defended by a 
brave and pati* + ic people. But alas, that the 
Machiavellian counsels of the Czar should ever 
have been listened to, so that even the glorious 
watchword of Hungary, " Moriamur pro rege 
nostro Maria Theresa," cannot now be expected 
to pass from lip to lip when the day of Austrian 
necessity shall dawn ! 

Europe may never recover from the effects of 
that great abandonment of his duty to himself, 
to Germany, and to Western Europe, of which 
the King of Prussia was then guilty. The 
proud and noble German nation was at that time 
curbed, and we see too well that it has not yet 
freed itself from the bit. Of Austria it may be 
said with some truth, that she has too often been 
the victim of circumstances ; but for Prussia 
there is no excuse. Gross injustice to Poland 
was indeed poorly compensated by gross injus- 
tice to Saxony. Prussia should have looked for 
allies to the west, and not to the north-east. 
Those north-eastern winds are ever cold and 
blighting ; while they prevail, the lovely flowers 
of freedom and civilisation can never thrive. 



48 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Russia has been the only gainer in the long 
rivalry between Austria and Prussia. From 
this narrow-minded and unworthy antagonism 
the loss to Germany has been incalculable. 
When Austria was at length obliged to acquiesce 
in the dismemberment of Saxony, she anxiously 
insisted that Dresden should not become a 
strong fortress, lest her Bohemian frontier 
might be endangered. This demand the Em- 
peror Alexander thought natural and proper: 
of course he did ; for while apparently securing 
Austria from Prussia, it weakened the defence of 
Germany on the Elbe. The more the treaties 
signed at the Congress of Vienna are examined, 
the more clearly does it appear that Russia was 
the only power to which they were an unmixed 
good. 

The policy of Prussia and Austria was most 
foolish ; its injustice was even more repre- 
hensible ; the excuses made for the partition of 
Saxony by the one, and the annexation of Lom- 
bardy and Venice by the other, are miserable 
sophistries. It was said that the King of Saxony 
had adhered to Napoleon's fortunes, and was 
consequently to be dealt with as an enemy, as 
though all the Three Great Powers had not till 
very lately worshipped the star of the French 
Emperor, and only deserted him when it was 



THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 49 

falling from its sphere ; and as though the King 
of Saxony could be considered a free agent, 
when his person and his capital were both in 
Napoleon's power. These apologies for injustice 
are as insulting to the understanding, as they 
are shocking to the moral feelings. In plain 
words, the incorporation of Saxony with Prussia 
was another partition of Poland, and the junc- 
tion of Lombardy and Venice with Austria was 
a still further aggravation of the wrongs done 
by the treaty of Campo Formio. While in- 
dustriously subverting all the works of Buona- 
parte, the high contracting parties at the Con- 
gress of Vienna scrupulously took care to imitate 
his crimes. 

France appeared at the Congress as a sorrow- 
ing Magdalen. Victory, so long her constant 
companion, had at length deserted her, and she 
stood with shame and contrition among the 
representatives of her foes. But she was France 
still. Broken, humbled, defeated, dismayed, she 
was still, and could not be other than, a noble 
nation. She was more to be respected in 
her fall, than some of her enemies in their day 
of triumph. All of them but one had crouched 
in the dust before her ; none of them singly had 
vanquished her ; it had tasked the united efforts 
of Europe to withstand her ; there she stood, 

E 



50 FOREIGN POLICY. 

silent, unpitied, exhausted, but with the warm 
blood still at her heart, the old fire in her eye, 
and the proud consciousness of undying glory 
on her brow. 

The future now began to be foreshadowed. It 
is not difficult to discover in the whispered objec- 
tions France ventured to make to some of the 
ambitious projects entertained by Russia and 
Prussia, an approach to the alliance with 
England which was in succeeding years to be 
fully established. After the battle of Waterloo, 
an intimate union of the two Western powers 
became a great political necessity. The allied 
governments boasted much about their gene- 
rosity in allowing France to remain in the con- 
dition in which she was in 1789. But her 
position was not, and could not be, the same as 
on the eve of the revolution. The whole face of 
Europe was changed ; and the relative position 
of France had materially altered. It might 
have been seen clearly that the annihilation of 
Poland had upset the ancient balance of Europe; 
and that at this very Congress, it was not our 
nearest neighbour whom we had most to dread. 
Even Russia, systematic in everything, was not 
prepared to consent to the partition of France; 
for Alexander saw well that the King of Prussia 
might thus be metamorphosed from a most de- 



THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 51 

voted friend into a most formidable adversary. 
Powerless as France then was, and dependent 
as was her king on the allied sovereigns, it 
ought not to be forgotten that she resisted as 
much as was in her power the injuries done to 
Saxony, to Genoa, and to Norway. 

But it is of England that the patriotic citizens 
of those much wronged countries have most 
reason to complain. The individual who con- 
ducted our negotiations at Vienna is now no 
more ; the great warrior to whom the triumph 
of the European despots was principally owing 
has also departed ; the arrangement contem- 
plated by the Congress has been almost in every 
respect unsettled : it can now serve no purpose 
either of ministers or of leaders of opposition 
to conceal the truth. It is then the painful 
but imperative duty of the historian and the 
philosopher to declare loudly that the treaties to 
which the broad seal of England was affixed at 
the Congress of Vienna, were most dishonourable 
to the nation, and to the statesman who repre- 
sented the English Government. These treatises 
are indeed indefensible : the object which they 
professed to accomplished was not attained ; 
Europe was not tranquillised ; the progress of re- 
volution was not checked ; it was even provoked 
and encouraged by such wicked compacts. How 

E 2 



52 FOREIGN POLICY. 

indeed could it be otherwise ? This agreement, 
was in the strictest sense revolutionary ; estab- 
lished rights were even more unscrupulously 
violated than by the Jacobins of 1793 ; every 
sentiment of patriotism and nationality was 
outraged ; nothing but the selfish interests of 
three great monarchies was respected. Even the 
healing influence of Time, that sooner or later 
alleviates the injustice inflicted by man, has not 
rendered the stipulations of the peace less re- 
volting. Turn where we may, the wounds then 
given are still green ; prescription has not sanc- 
tified those incongruous unions ; the progress of 
forty years has not made them venerable. The 
treaties made " In the name of the most holy and 
undivided Trinity " at Vienna, remain accursed 
both by God and man. 

England had taken no part in either the first 
or the second partition of Poland ; until 1814 her 
hands were stainless. It was only in the moment 
of victory, after Providence had blessed her arms 
with such unparalleled success, that she con- 
sented to be the accomplice in evil deeds for the 
sake of winning the applause of the despotic 
courts. She gained nothing herself by those 
measures ; but she ought to have prevented them ; 
most certainly she ought not to have co-operated 
in them. She should even have braved the 



THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 53 

menace of Alexander ; she should have had the 
courage, in the cause of justice and humanity, to 
defy the united legions of Prussia and Russia. 
Nothing is ever gained by littleness in great 
affairs. We may depend upon it, that had her 
voice been earnestly raised against the dis- 
memberment of Saxony, the annihilation of 
Poland, and the union of Norway with Sweden, 
backed as the remonstrances of the English 
monarch must have been by the great English 
General, at the head of that gallant host which 
he himself boasted of being able "to go any- 
where and do any thing," her appeal would have 
been listened to, and the great triumph at 
Waterloo have been surpassed by a still nobler 
moral victory. To what a height she must then 
have been exalted among the nations ! The 
world had a right to expect this duty from her ; 
and had her representations been of no avail, if 
the rights of the weaker were to be so shamefully 
sacrificed at Vienna, the least to be expected 
from our government was that it should have 
perceived that an English diplomatist had no 
business there. 

Yet what after all had England to fear from 
those hundred thousands of Russian troops on 
which the Czar so confidently relied ? It was 
England that had supplied Russia with the 

E 3 



51 FOREIGN POLICY. 

sinews of war. The financial resources of 
Alexander were drained, and had it not been 
for the seven millions of English gold which he 
received in the two years of 1814 and 1815, 
the Russian troops never would have been seen 
in the plains of Champagne, never would have 
influenced the decisions of the Congress, never 
would have threatened the liberties of Europe. 
But as long as our ministers could pass the 
army and navy estimates, and induce Parliament 
to sanction subsidy after subsidy to foreign 
powers, they thought that they performed all 
the duties of an enlightened administration. 
Great men are not always ready when they 
are wanted. England at that time needed 
statesmen, and she appeared to have none. 
The politicians who filled the highest offices of 
the state had acquired their power from their 
ostentatious hatred of the Pope and Napoleon. 
This was then considered the whole duty of a 
statesman ; this comprehended all the qualifi- 
cations for a ruler of mankind. But these 
qualifications, such as they might be, were in- 
dispensable ; and the consequence was, that the 
indignant wisdom of a Mackintosh, a Brougham, 
a Horner, a Eomilly, was laughed at by the five 
hundred ardent Protestants who implicitly con- 



THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 55 

fided in a Castlereagh, a Liverpool, and a Van- 
sittart. 

England has won great battles, founded mighty 
empires, established a constitutional government 
such as has never yet been equalled, produced 
the greatest of dramatists and the greatest of 
political philosophers; but she has never been 
able to negotiate successfully a great, advan- 
tageous, and glorious peace. Again and again 
have the acquisitions of her arms been sacrificed 
through the incompetence of her diplomatists. 
At the peace of Utrecht, the triumphs of Marl- 
borough were rendered fruitless through the dis- 
honesty of Bolingbroke. At the peace of Paris, 
the trophies of Chatham were surrendered by 
the Earl of Bute. And now, at the Congress 
of Vienna, the political and commercial advan- 
tages of England, dearly purchased as they had 
been by six hundred millions of debt, were 
abandoned through the weakness and ignorance 
of Castlereagh. He doubtless meant well; he 
did not act wrong through any sinister motives ; 
but he was, from the beginning to the end of 
those important conferences, over-reached by 
the European sovereigns, and their able but 
unscrupulous ministers. He believed that they 
were sincere in their professions. He supposed 
that they would fulfil the promises they had 

E 4 



56 FOREIGN POLICY. 

made to their subjects. His vanity was flat- 
tered by thus meeting on equal terms the great 
potentates of the world. Their insidious com- 
pliments almost turned his head ; and during 
his residence at Vienna, he evidently forgot 
that he was the minister of a constitutional 
monarchy. He thus permitted himself to be 
entangled in schemes which had nothing but 
despotic selfishness to recommend them -, lent the 
name of England to those immoral treaties by 
which millions of human beings were disposed 
of like counters, without the slightest regard to 
their feelings or interests ; and involved this 
country so deeply with the worst projects of 
absolutism, that her fair fame was tarnished, 
and the evils she countenanced incalculable. 
He never seems to have reflected that disgrace- 
ful as some of those arrangements were, they 
were more disgraceful to the English minister 
who agreed to them, than to those who pro- 
jected them, and for the simple reason that he 
was the minister of a free country, the repre- 
sentative of a nation that boasted of its happy 
and liberal constitution, the nation that pro- 
fessed to have done so much for the indepen- 
dence and freedom of the world. 

The fact that England herself acquired vir- 
tually nothing, and lost much by those treaties, 



THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 57 

does not make the spectacle of our guilt less 
odious. England was not even in the elevated 
situation of the villain who consents to assist 
in nefarious transactions for a consideration. 
Lord Castlereagh gloried in the generosity of 
his country. Since we had taken the office of 
Paymaster General for Europe, some of the 
tempting fields of commerce which we had 
fairly won might have been opened to us. 
But Lord Castlereagh was far above such sor- 
did notions. Of commercial matters he knew 
nothing and cared nothing. It was enough 
that Napoleon had been vanquished, that the 
Bourbons were once more placed upon the 
throne of France, and that the Emperor of 
Kussia was our very good friend. 

But if England chose to exhibit herself as an 
example of disinterestedness, she was at least 
bound to take care of her allies. Sweden had 
been faithful to her in great difficulties. When 
Russia declared war against England, in servile 
obedience to the commands of Napoleon, she 
seized upon Finland, as a guarantee of the good 
intentions of the Court of Stockholm, and posi- 
tively refused to acknowledge the neutrality of 
Sweden. Now here was a case, in which, if 
Lord Castlereagh had had the least claim to 
statesmanship or ordinary foresight, or had felt in 



58 FOREIGN POLICY. 

any degree the obligations of honour, he could not 
have shrunk from seeing justice done. Sweden, 
even by the acknowledgments of Prussia and 
Eussia themselves, had deserved well of the allied 
sovereigns. The least that she had a right to ex- 
pect from the Congress of Vienna, and especially 
from England, was that Finland should be again 
restored to her crown. But her representations 
were contemptuously disregarded, and that im- 
portant province of the Baltic, which belonged 
to Sweden by every law of nature and of 
nations, by the bonds of race, of religion, of 
glory, and of prescription, was ceded to Russia. 
The brave Finlanders were thus given to a 
master whom they detested, and, as some com- 
pensation to Sweden, the British fleet was igno- 
miniously engaged in forcing the equally brave 
Norwegians from the dominion of Denmark 
which they loved, that Norway might be given 
to Sweden in exchange for Finland. By this 
preposterous arrangement, the position of Russia 
in the Baltic was strengthened, her less powerful 
neighbours more than proportionately weakened ; 
and by the acquisition of Finland, she gained 
a most valuable supply of daring seamen, who 
at once made her navy a formidable rival to 
that of England. The Finns, who now 
man the Russian ships of the line, cannot be 



THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 59 

despised even by the stoutest sailors, who are 
so eager to display their noble qualities amid 
the angry waves and the narrow channels of 
the Kussian coast. Many of our finest ves- 
sels, and the blood of many of their brave de- 
fenders, must be sacrificed before Finland can 
be taken from Russia, and the imbecile blun- 
dering of Lord Castlereagh remedied. This 
minister had the most boundless confidence in 
the Czar, who so generously permitted us to 
keep the Ionian Islands. We might take them, 
and Malta, and be thankful. Lord Castlereagh 
felt the most lively emotions of gratitude. But 
the horizon was not altogether free from clouds, 
even in that halcyon hour. There had been 
a loud outcry about the wrongs of Saxony 
and Genoa, from the opposition in the British 
Parliament. Our allies were offended at such 
plain speaking ; they were indignant that there 
should be any corner of the earth in which 
the injustice of their actions could be denounced 
in open day : Lord Castlereagh had to listen to 
many serious remonstrances on this subject, and, 
it was said, condescended to make some humble 
apologies for this presumptuous freedom of his 
countrymen. Who could look on such a bril- 
liant constellation of majesty, and remain un- 
dazzled ? Is it to be wondered at, if the pro- 



60 FOREIGN POLICY. 

jector of the expedition to Walcheren began 
to be somewhat ashamed of being the Foreign 
Minister of a merely constitutional monarchy ? 
Other ministers were not annoyed by what might 
be said of them in Parliament. Other ministers 
were not so much compromised by the blunder- 
ing answers of their colleagues, that they were 
obliged to write and tell them not to answer 
any questions on foreign policy until their 
return. Other ministers had not to face, on 
arriving home, the keen criticism of the Whigs 
who could not be silenced, and whom it was 
not easy to answer. The blessings of our 
excellent constitution decidedly appeared more 
and more questionable to Lord Castlereagh the 
longer he remained at Vienna, among the dis- 
tinguished sovereigns and accomplished diplo- 
matists, who decided on the fate of men and 
nations without hearing a murmur, and by a 
single stroke of the pen. 

Still it was necessary, on his return, for him 
to take his seat on the ministerial benches of 
the House of Commons. He courageously 
met his opponents face to face, and attempted 
to defend negotiations which really admitted 
of no defence. Perhaps the most singular 
specimens of logic and oratory preserved even 
in the many volumes of Parliamentary Debates 



THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 61 

which now threaten to excite the wonder of 
future ages from their rapidly increasing num- 
bers, are those speeches of Lord Castlereagh 
in support of the treaties which he had so 
recently signed. He considered it a sound 
and conclusive reply to Sir James Mackin- 
tosh's moral reprobation of the outrage on 
Saxony, to declare that u the object was to give 
Prussia additional force, and increased popula- 
tion was that force." This is the reasoning of 
plenipotentiaries on the rights of nations ; it is 
not surprising that such logic has resulted in 
the terrible catastrophes of the last forty years. 
But popular leaders are frequently as blind 
and reckless as the servants of arbitrary sove- 
reigns. Even the members of the opposition 
did not show themselves much distinguished by 
political sagacity. In discussing the new boun- 
daries of empires it was France that they kept 
constantly in view, and it was France that they 
most professed to fear. If Lord Castlereagh was 
to blame in trusting too implicitly in the pro- 
testations of Alexander, so also were some emi- 
nent politicians who believed themselves to be 
the champions of national freedom. The Whigs 
of that day were not behind the Tories in their 
devotion to the Czar. It may perhaps be more 
correctly said, that the alliance with Eussia 



62 FOREIGN POLICY. 

received especially the approval of that distin- 
guished section of the Whigs who followed in 
the footsteps of Charles Fox. They remembered 
how their favourite statesman had so enthusias- 
tically declared himself in favour of an intimate 
union with Russia. They remembered the 
Ocsakow negotiations. They remembered what 
cordial sympathy there had formerly been 
between Mr. Fox and the Empress Catherine, 
who had placed the bust of the English states- 
man beside those of Cicero and Demosthenes. 
The views which Burke entertained with regard 
to the developement of the Russian power were 
certainly not held by the hereditary leader of 
the Whig aristocracy. They who look atten- 
tively at the aspect of public affairs at the 
moment when Fox and Burke separated for 
ever, will find that there was another great 
political question besides that of the French 
revolution, on which the opinions of these two 
men were diametrically opposed. It was at the 
conclusion of a speech violently in favour of 
Russia, that Fox first publicly announced his 
decided disagreement with his old friend on 
French affairs. 

Neither party can make any particular pre- 
tensions to political sagacity in discussing the 
acts of the Congress. To both of them the 



THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 63 

future was a blank, or was filled with menacing 
spectres of French ambition. But as the Holy 
Alliance took shape, and its designs were seen, a 
gradual change in the sentiments of both Whigs 
and Tories began to operate. It was felt that 
the deliverance of Europe was more apparent 
than real. It was felt that the "tyranny and 
despotism" which Lord Castlereagh took credit to 
himself for having overthrown, still existed, had 
indeed only changed hands, and had become even 
more alarming by the change. It was felt, in 
the language of the poet, that after having struck 
the lion down, the national life of Europe was 
abandoned to the foul dominion of the wolf. 
Even Lord Castlereagh himself at length saw 
that it was impossible for England any longer 
to follow implicitly in the wake of her allies. 
When they declared their hostility to all free 
institutions which were not voluntarily granted 
by sovereigns, they only asserted what was in 
strict accordance with the spirit of those memor- 
able treaties of the great European Congress. 
But this tendency began now to be plainly 
discerned. Keluctant as our ministers may 
have been to confess it, -they at last acknow- 
ledged that such assemblies of monarchs, settling 
at their good will and pleasure the different 
boundaries of kingdoms, annihilating some, por- 



64 FOREIGN POLICY. 

tioning others, and coercing every state , that 
could not meet them on equal terms, were 
directly opposed to every principle of the British 
Constitution. They set at nought every lawwhich 
our ancestors struggled so long and so gloriously 
to establish. They annihilated all real freedom ; 
for no constitution could be called free, which 
depended on the mere pleasure of the giver. 

Such, however, were the ideas of freedom held 
by the rulers of the world whose names were 
signed to the treaties of Vienna ; and in strict 
accordance with such ideas were all their pro- 
visions framed. It is for this reason that every 
patriotic Englishman must deeply regret that 
such stipulations ever received the sanction of 
an English minister. Had these treaties been 
strictly adhered to by the other powers, it is 
difficult to see how the countenance of England 
could have been withdrawn even from the fur- 
ther proceedings of the arbitrary princes, with- 
out a breach of faith. England did not even 
protest against the Holy Alliance ; by the 
organ of her Government she seemed to sanc- 
tion its formation. It certainly appeared that 
the Prince Regent and his advisers fully ap- 
proved of what they durst not boldly applaud. 
This state of things could not last. Fortunately 
for England, the governments who surely counted 



THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA. 65 

on her assistance in all their efforts, soon over- 
stepped all the bounds of moderation, and 
showed themselves in their true colours. For- 
tunately for human freedom, there was one 
English statesman, who though strictly a Con- 
servative, had the wisdom, the genius, and the 
power to break those shackles which were being 
so closely forged, and to establish those sound 
principles of foreign policy which have never 
since been abandoned. 



F 



66 FOREIGN POLICY. 



CHAP. III. 

CANNING. — THE CONGRESS OF VERONA. — FRENCH INVASION 

OF SPAIN. DESIGNS OF THE HOLY ALLIANCE. PORTUGAL. 

— CANNING'S MERITS AS A STATESMAN AND ORATOR. — 
NEW PRINCIPLES OF FOREIGN POLICY. 

The name of George Canning excites peculiar 
feelings in the breast of every sensitive student 
of our parliamentary history. The enthusiasm 
which the contemplation of his character kindles 
is something very different from what is generally 
felt for eminent statesmen. It is more akin 
to what we experience in perusing a poem or 
a romance, than what belongs naturally to the 
stern and calculating political world in which it 
is the fate of so many great men to live, and toil, 
and die. The literary man finds in the character 
of Canning much to sympathise with ; for this 
statesman might have enriched the language with 
masterpieces of English composition. Ardent, 
ingenuous, learned, eloquent, accomplished, no 
mind was ever distinguished by more versatile 
powers, and no English orator ever so much 
delighted his audience. Politics with him were 



CANNING. 67 

a profession ; and as with all professions which 
are unrecognised, this pursuit of professional 
statesmanship was by no means so remunerative 
to its votary as, in his case, it was beneficial to 
his country. Politics with him were an art ; 
and he suffered the fate of the artist in the bustle 
of active life surrounded by more worldly and 
commonplace natures. A greater contrast it 
would be difficult to imagine than that between 
Canning and his predecessor in the Foreign Office. 
Lord Castlereagh was to a ludicrous extent defi- 
cient in those intellectual accomplishments which 
his rival so eminently possessed. But Lord 
Castlereagh became, through Mr. Canning's in- 
firmity of purpose, the more successful minister ; 
because he applied all the energies of his some- 
what contracted intellect to the safe and vulgar 
routine of official business ; and had the gratifi- 
cation of directing, at a most important crisis 
in the history of the world, the man who, when 
Foreign Secretary, had declared him incapable of 
being Minister of War. This was the most signal 
victory ever gained by mediocrity over genius. 
Happy would it have been for mankind had it 
not also been, as unfortunately such triumphs 
generally are, in the highest degree disastrous to 
the nation. Happy would it have been had it 

not in some degree dimmed the lustre of this 

F 2. 



68 FOREIGN FOLICY. 

brilliant politician's career, which deserves the 
admiration of all Englishmen. It cannot be 
denied, that but for Mr. Canning's weakness, 
Lord Castlereagh might never have been Foreign 
Minister, and still more certainly never would 
have represented England at the Congress of 
Vienna. Mr. Canning might himself have been 
in the Foreign Office during all the time when it 
fell to Lord Castlereagh to direct with such un- 
questioned supremacy the external relations 
of the country. He might himself have been 
the English plenipotentiary at Vienna, and have 
been a powerful means of preventing all the 
misdeeds of the Congress ; and thus, while 
directly contributing to the welfare of nations 
and saving the honour of England, have gained 
for himself immortal glory. He afterwards 
deeply regretted that he had not had the direc- 
tion of the foreign policy in 1814 and 1815. 
He saw that he had lost that golden opportunity 
which only comes once to statesmen. The " for- 
tunate moment," when it is once allowed to slip 
away, never returns. 

It is easy to imagine the silent indignation 
with which Canning must have observed some of 
those public transactions which originated in 
the Congress, but which he was powerless to 
remedy. His residence at Lisbon through all 
that eventful diplomatic period is only too signi- 



LORD CASTLEREAGH. 69 

ficant. He knew not what to do. He was poor ; 
he could scarcely afford to live without office, and 
yet office could only be obtained by keeping on 
at least some terms with the friends of Lord 
Castlereagh. The Foreign Secretary was plainly 
in power for life ; the many great affairs he 
had directed had given him a complete ascen- 
dancy in the administration. Hated by the 
country, ridiculed by the Whigs, he was abso- 
lutely adored by the steady supporters of the 
government, who voted night after night without 
asking questions, and comforted themselves with 
remembering the glories of Waterloo. Canning 
found it necessary first to absent himself from 
England, to devote himself afterwards to 
the Indian Board, and at last to accept the 
appointment of Governor General. This is the 
true explanation of that part of Canning's poli- 
tical life from 1814 to 1822 ; it is impossible to 
account for his conduct satisfactorily in any other 
manner. 

We might wish to see a man with so many 
noble qualities act more like a hero ; but it is in- 
dispensably necessary to paint him as he is. At 
length the death of Lord Castlereagh unexpect- 
edly released Canning from the fetters which he 
had allowed to be placed on him, and his eman- 
cipated genius at once soared to that lofty height 

F 3 



70 FOREIGN POLICY. 

at which it ever afterwards winged its way. 
The five years which yet remained to him amply 
redeemed his fame ; and under his auspices Eng- 
land became once more herself. 

In justice to Lord Castlereagh it must be 
acknowledged that he had already objected to the 
proceedings of the despotic sovereigns, and was 
gradually becoming more conscious of the real 
intentions of the Holy Alliance* The moment 
that the military occupation of France ceased ? 
the ill-sorted union of England with the despotic 
governments began to dissolve. A constitutional 
monarchy and the principles of the Holy Alliance 
were absolutely incompatible. This even Count 
Ficquelmont admits when he relates, fairly 
enough, the reasons why the British Government 
declined acceding to the preliminary protocol of 
Troppau, which was drawn up by the three courts 
in order to justify their armed intervention in 
putting down the Neapolitan revolution. " Such 
principles," says this author, " never had been 
those of England;" and he adds, "she resumed 
her ancient independence, which had always been 
the foundation of her policy." This is explicit, 
and requires to be remembered when judgment 
is passed on the actions of the statesmen who 
have still more recently had the management of 
our Foreign Affairs. By the confession of Count 



DESIGNS OF THE HOLY ALLIANCE. 71 

Ficquelmont it is clear tliat when the same 
English Minister who signed the Treaties of 
Vienna was still in office, England was obliged 
to withdraw from an intimate connection with 
the three courts. And according also to a most 
important memorandum of Lord Castlereagh, an 
alliance of the great military monarchs for the 
object which was then avowed, "threatened to 
annihilate the secondary states of Europe." 

But Lord Castlereagh went further, and de- 
clared that such an object was never contem- 
plated when the alliance was first formed. There 
can be no doubt that he believed this object was 
not originally contemplated, but there can be 
as little doubt that from the first it was the 
design of the other governments. And this 
shows how lamentably this minister was deceived 
when he, even for one moment, allowed himself 
and his country to countenance the projects of 
the Holy Alliance. He could never have become 
the decided opponent of the allies. His protests 
must ever have been feeble. He admitted the 
right of Austria to interfere in crushing the 
revolutionists at Naples, although he refused to 
adopt the general principles of the Confederacy. 
But if Austria could interfere by force of arms 
to destroy the constitution of Naples, according 
to every rule of logic 3 France had an equal right 

r 4 



'72 FOREIGN POLICY. 

to interfere in overturning the Constitution of 
Spain, of which that of Naples was acknowledged 
to be the offspring. It is plain that when once 
the crusade against Liberalism was begun, it 
must produce an internecine war between two 
rival opinions, and could only end in the de- 
struction of every free constitution, and in the 
abrogation of all international law. It is not 
improbable that Lord Castlereagh saw the false 
position in which he was placed, and that the 
anxiety of his situation preyed upon his mind, 
and contributed to produce that melancholy ter- 
mination at once of his political and natural 
existence, at the moment when he was about 
to renew his unavailing protest against that 
tyrannical combination of which he had formerly 
been the honest, but deceived apologist. 

Mr. Canning's return to the Foreign Office 
ushered in a new state of things. It was the 
commencement of the political era which extends 
to the present day. The diplomatists of the 
Holy Alliance soon had reason to recognise the 
new spirit which ruled over the foreign policy. 
The minister could neither be duped nor des- 
pised. The necessities of the time were urgent ; 
on the day when he accepted the seals the pro- 
ceedings of the Alliance demanded his undivided 
attention. 



REVOLUTIONS. 73 

During his long absence from the Foreign 
Office, the whole condition of the civilised world 
had changed. When, after his quarrel with 
Lord Castlereagh, he left the administration in 
the September of 1809, Buonaparte was omni- 
potent on the Continent, threatened Europe with 
subjugation, and saw his mandates obeyed over 
the Peninsula ; Wellington had not yet disturbed 
the calculations of the imperial conqueror, and a 
belief in his invincibility was rapidly becoming 
prevalent ;. the Bourbons appeared hopelessly ex- 
pelled from the soil of France and Spain. Four- 
teen years big with the fate of empires had rolled 
on, Wellington had conquered both France and 
Spain for the Bourbons ; the hereditary govern- 
ments had been restored ; and it is indeed in- 
structive to find that the first act of Canning 
on again becoming Foreign Minister was a re- 
fusal to sanction another invasion of Spain by 
France under her legitimate sovereign, who thus 
proved, that after all the magniloquent professions 
in favour of peace, freedom, and independence, 
the rights of nations were as little respected by 
the Bourbons and the Three Great Powers as they 
had been by their immortal enemy. Much as 
France had suffered by war, much as the ag- 
gressive spirit of Napoleon had been condemned, 
the first army that crossed the French frontiers 



74 FOREIGN POLICY. 

after the Restoration was for the purpose of de- 
stroying a constitution and of establishing a des- 
potism. This is a curious spectacle for a 
philosopher. Louis the Eighteenth was always 
professing his desire to render France exactly 
what she was when Louis the Sixteenth occupied 
the throne. But that unfortunate monarch never 
would have done what his successor thus rashly did ; 
nor, before statesmen had become familiar with 
those violent acts of power which the successive 
partitions of Poland, the revolutionary usurpa- 
tions, and the deeds of the Viennese plenipoten- 
tiaries brought into fashion, would such wrongs 
have been tolerated. Notwithstanding the parade 
of legitimacy, every thing was revolutionary. 
Monarchists and republicans, the partisans of 
order and the partisans of freedom, showed them- 
selves at heart tyrants ; and their acts and their 
professions were subversive of all political mo- 
rality. On every side the same storm and tur- 
bulence meets the saddening gaze. The angry 
waters were out, and nowhere could the sacred 
ark of true freedom find a resting place. 

It can serve no purpose to dwell on the mis- 
takes and follies of the Neapolitan and Spanish 
Liberals. Revolutions made by such hands had 
little chance of being successful ; they were men 
destitute of all the qualities and all the experience 



CONGRESS OF VERONA. 75 

which are indispensable in statesmen. But 
though their errors and crimes must be repro- 
bated r they were at least as honest and as able as 
the tyrants who were forced upon them by the 
bayonets of the Great Powers. When w r e 
attempt to justify those violent assaults on the 
independence of nations for no other object than 
the lowest selfishness, we are indeed guilty of 
the highest treason against those moral laws 
which have done so much for England. 

Could the allied sovereigns have had the least 
compunction or forethought, they would have 
been warned by the strong remonstrances of the 
great man who represented England at Verona. 
It was the Duke of Wellington, the soldier who 
had delivered Europe, conquered Napoleon, 
placed the Bourbons on the thrones of France 
and Spain, and won the independence of the 
Peninsula, who now protested against the 
invasion of Spain by the armies of a Bourbon. 
And yet he was not listened to. His emphatic 
warning was of no avail. Canning's memorable 
" come what may," which announced the sepa- 
ration of England for ever from the schemes of 
the allies, produced no change in their ultimate 
determination. It only drew the Northern 
Powers closer together, and made the league of 
despotism more complete. They had been sue- 



76 FOREIGN POLICY. 

cessful in Naples, and were now to be successful 
in Spain. What cared they for the English 
constitution ? Might not the day come when 
England herself would feel the power of the 
Holy Alliance ? Had they not virtually declared 
war against the Parliament of England when 
they publicly announced that they would ac- 
knowledge no constitutions which had not been 
freely given by Kings to their subjects ? Such 
indeed was the fact. The decree of the National 
Convention in 1792, by which " fraternity and 
assistance " were promised to all nations who 
wished to recover their liberties, was justly 
considered a declaration of war against every 
monarchical government. This announcement 
of the Holy Alliance was as plainly a declaration 
of war against every constitutional state. The 
folly of the French Kepublicans in the days 
when Jacobinism was rampant, was fully 
equalled by the folly of the Legitimists in their 
day of successful reaction. 

That England would have suffered the same 
fate as Naples and Spain, had it not been for 
the power and energy of her people, cannot be 
doubted. The allies, even at this time, ventured 
to interfere with our government. On the 
appointment of Sir W. A' Court to the post of 
Ambassador at Madrid, the ministers of the 



CONGRESS OF VERONA. 77 

Great Powers called in a body on Mr. Canning 
and remonstrated against the choice. This step 
shows to what our alliance with the despotic 
courts was tending, and in what, had it not 
been for the vigour and determination of our 
statesmen, it must have ended. 

The policy which England first adopted in 
1822, was really forced upon her; our ministers 
were obliged to choose between the friendship 
of her Continental Allies and the blessings of 
her free constitution. It was plain that both 
could not exist together. This consideration 
alone is enough to justify Mr. Canning and 
the statesmen who have succeeded him ; it is 
enough to answer all the reproaches and the 
invectives of Count Ficquelmont. 

Canning, with his thoroughly English nature, 
never liked congresses of diplomatists and sove- 
reigns. They are, in fact, monstrosities in 
politics, and mere convenient apologies for ty- 
ranny. At what congress of the sovereigns 
and statesmen of the Continent were the rights 
and liberties of nations respected ? What con- 
gress has not had a secret object different from 
that which was publicly avowed ? 

It was at first supposed that the quarrels of 
Eussia and Turkey were to be the prominent 
topic of deliberation at Verona. But when the 



78 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Duke of Wellington arrived in Paris, he found 
that the projected invasion of Spain was to be 
the real subject of discussion. It was at that 
time asserted, and is now beyond dispute, that 
the Emperor of Russia really encouraged Louis 
the Eighteenth and his ministers in their designs 
on Spain. His object was of course to produce 
dissension between England and France, that he 
might carry out his plans in Turkey without 
being confronted by an alliance between the 
Western Powers. He therefore professed great 
moderation. He was willing to submit his dis- 
putes with the Sultan to the mediation of Eng- 
land. And in the meanwhile he was doing 
what he could to render our alliance between 
England and France impossible ; for he well 
knew that England neither could nor would 
approve of the destruction of the Spanish con- 
stitution, and that the more despotic principles 
were established by the Bourbons in France, 
and throughout the Peninsula, the more were 
the sovereigns of these countries dependent upon 
himself. 

He succeeded for a time. The French army 
advanced into Spain. The Spanish Liberals, 
who had disregarded the wise and parental ad- 
vice of the Duke of Wellington, to take away 
all pretence for foreign interference by making 



canning's foreign policy. 79 

some changes in their constitution, which could 
not be altogether defended, were defeated. The 
Bourbons triumphed ; the campaign was emi- 
nently successful ; and the white flag was once 
more associated with victory. England had 
preserved her neutrality ; and for taking this 
pacific course our minister was as much assailed 
by the Liberals at home, as for refusing to join 
in support of the invasion, he was condemned 
by courtiers and emperors abroad. Such is ever 
the destiny of the statesman who endeavours 
to avoid extremes and to steer a middle course. 
Half measures are always unpopular, and they 
are not seldom unwise. But England could not 
save the Spanish constitution ; despotism for a 
moment was the rage in Spain ; the mistakes of 
the legislators of Cadiz had been many and 
ruinous ; Canning could only regret what he 
had not the power to retrieve. 

He turned his eyes to South America, and 
resolved to be beforehand with the French 
ministers. If France was irresistible in Spain, 
he determined that the Indies should not fall 
into her power. The tardy recognition of the 
independence of the Spanish colonies was not 
pleasing to the English Liberals. The minister 
proceeded with every due consideration to the 
feelings of Spain, and anxiously endeavoured to 



80 FOREIGN TOLICY. 

prevail on her to acknowledge what was really 
a fact. It is not surprising, however, that the 
Spaniards to the last moment resisted the stern 
necessity of publicly divesting themselves of the 
brightest jewels of the crown. Step by step 
Canning proceeded ; until at length the national 
existence of the South American republics was 
acknowledged by England. That this policy 
was sound, few men will now deny. It is true 
that the great things which were once expected 
from these states have not been accomplished. 
But it is equally true that Spain never could 
have permanently kept them under her flag. 
Had it not been for England, there can be little 
doubt that before this day they would have 
been incorporated with the ever- extending terri- 
tories of the great republic of North America. 
Cuba, the last and dearest possession of Spain, 
is more than threatened ; and can only be saved 
from the grasp of the United States by the 
vigorous interposition of France and England. 

Yet there are some few writers on political 
affairs to whom such considerations are of no 
weight. A voluminous historian, in the second 
volume of a work which is now in progress, 
finds everything to applaud in the French inva- 
sion of Spain, and everything to condemn in 
Canning's recognition of the independence of the 



81 

Spanish colonies. After having seen the fate 
of the Bourbons, and observed the irresistible 
tendency of human affairs for thirty years, to 
find an English author who aspires to be a great 
political authority declaring that this invasion 
of Spain "was not only a wise measure on the 
part of the Bourbon government, but fully 
justifiable on the best principles of international 
law ; " * that " it was a model of energy and 
moderation," is indeed extraordinary. The 
fact that such a man exists at the present day 
must be ranked among intellectual and moral 
prodigies. To reason with him would of course 
be hopeless. Certain politicians must be classed 
among those ingenious inventors who attempt 
to fly or to walk upon water, and hold up 
their hands with astonishment and indigna- 
tion when they find that the law of gravitation 
continues to act, and that their admirable con- 
trivances, made in opposition to every sound 
mechanical and natural principle, are of no 
avail. 

Canning was not an unsafe statesman. His 
foreign policy was as admirable for its wisdom 
as for its brilliancy. It only appears bold and 

* See Alison's History of Europe from the Fall of Napo- 
leon, vol.ii. pp.736 and 738. 

G 



82 FOREIGN POLICY. 

adventurous when compared with the tameness 
and insufficiency of that which he super- 
seded. England was unaccustomed to see a 
man of genius, with extended views and a de- 
termination of his own, in the Foreign Office ; 
and the popularity of the minister was bound- 
less. But he manfully refused to lend himself 
to the designs of the extreme Liberals, and 
powerfully contended for those broad principles 
of policy which are only worthy of a great and 
glorious empire. The interest of England was 
the watchword ever in his mouth ; and he fol- 
lowed that interest sincerely and wisely. He 
loved peace and dreaded the approach of war ; 
because, as he said repeatedly, the next war, 
whenever it broke out, must be very different 
from any other contest. He saw that it would 
be a war of opinion, a war in which hostile 
principles, and not merely hostile nations, would 
be arrayed against each other. But though he 
resisted the people, and even many eminent 
politicians, when they wished to see England 
embark once more in war for the indefinite 
object which was at stake in the Spanish inva- 
sion, he boldly looked war in the face when the 
constitution of our " oldest ally " was menaced, 
and sent British troops once more to occupy the 
heights of Lisbon. 



CANNING AS AN ORATOR. 83 

It was natural that the success of despotism 
in Spain should induce the admirers of uncon- 
trolled power to make an attempt on the free 
constitution of Portugal. But the faith of 
England was pledged to protect the dominions 
of the young princess ; and the speech made by 
our Foreign Minister on the King's message 
must ever be considered as one of the finest 
oratorical efforts in our parliamentary annals. 
It was indeed ■ worthy of himself and of the 
occasion ; although the passage so often quoted, 
and so loudly praised, about " calling the Old 
World into existence to redress the balance of 
the New," scarcely deserves the extravagant 
admiration it has received. His biographers 
have given that sentence in capital letters, as 
though the force of language could no further 
go. But it means nothing. If the balance of 
freedom against despotism had depended upon 
the weight of the republics of South America, 
the liberties of mankind must indeed have been 
in a hopeless state, and the scale of freedom 
have kicked the beam. One single province of 
the United States, inhabited by the Anglo- 
Saxon race, is, as a counterpoise to despotism, 
worth all the republics which the ardent orator 
boasted of having called into existence. The 
sentiment is hyperbolical, and can only be ex- 

G 2 



84 FOREIGN POLICY. 

cused by supposing that it inadvertently escaped 
from his lips as he was speaking in reply amid 
the tumultuous cheers of the House of Commons. 
The respectable member who afterwards said 
that on hearing this sentence he could not but 
look with astonishment at the orator, and doubt 
the evidence of his senses, might well do so; but 
perhaps as much from the boldness of the meta- 
phor as from just appreciation. 

Such faults are not frequent -in the speeches 
of Canning. His taste was only too fastidious. 
He naturally shunned violent metaphors and 
bombastic language. He was the last of that 
race of great orators which commenced with 
Chatham. The style of parliamentary debating 
changed with the reform of the House of Com- 
mons ; gentlemen began to talk, not to the 
members in the House, but to the people out of 
doors. The statesman then remembered that 
the cheers of his party were not enough ; that he 
must have the people with him ; and adapt his 
arguments to their understandings. He was 
compelled to indulge in details, and avoid as 
much as possible the brilliant generalities of 
former speakers. Hence the age of great orators 
has departed. Ministers and leaders of oppo- 
sition all speak to the reporters' gallery, and not 
to the Speaker's chair, or to the green benches. 



CANNING AS A STATESMAN. 85 

The best speech is not that which is delivered 
with the most effect in the House, but that 
which reads best in the newspaper of the fol- 
lowing morning. Oratory has gained little by 
this change. Many of the introductory expo- 
sitions of ministers are elaborate pamphlets ; 
perhaps the hours of deliberation might be 
shortened, and public business much facilitated, 
if the prolix development of a particular line of 
policy were printed before the debate commences, 
and the form of our legislative proceedings be 
adapted to the novel circumstances of this re- 
formed generation. 

But however interesting this alteration in the 
style of parliamentary speaking may be to the 
student of our manners, not much harm is done 
by adhering to the old forms. A more serious 
innovation commenced while Canning was Fo- 
reign Secretary. If he was the last of great 
orators, he was also the first of our great states- 
men who became so peculiarly obnoxious to 
foreign governments, that they did not hesitate 
to set on foot all kinds of intrigues to bring 
about his dismissal. Of all the evils that can 
afflict a state, this interference of foreigners in 
the appointments to the great offices of a na- 
tional administration is the most terrible, and 
carries with it the most tremendous consequences. 

G 3 



86 FOREIGN POLICY. 

It ought ever to be jealously guarded against, 
for the man who countenances it is guilty of the 
worst of treasons. We may be assured, that 
however it may be disguised, whatever may 
be the pretences made for it, at no time and 
in no circumstances can it ever produce good. 
This it is imperatively necessary to remember, 
because it must happen that the minister whose 
policy is most patriotic, who is least ready to 
sacrifice any of the interests of his country to 
gain the applause of other governments, is the 
most likely to be the object of such insidious 
manoeuvres. The ablest, wisest, and most public- 
spirited of the statesmen of James the Second's 
reign, the Earl of Halifax, was the man whom 
Louis the Fourteenth and his ambassador en- 
deavoured to drive from the English Ministry, 
because the French king knew that the accom- 
plished nobleman was bent on pursuing a truly 
national policy, by supporting Holland, and op- 
posing the designs of France. When James the 
•Second parted with Halifax, he dismissed his 
best counsellor ; and the subsequent misfortunes 
of the Stuarts may be dated from that memorable 
resignation. After the Revolution, no minister 
except Bolingbroke ever abandoned the straight 
and intelligible line of English policy. From 
that time, French influence was powerless in 



CANNING AS A STATESMAN. 87 

Downing Street. Much as Chatham was feared 
abroad, no foreign minister ventured to pass the 
limits of his recognised diplomatic duties ; and 
much as George the Second disliked his proud 
and haughty secretary, he was too honest a man, 
and hated France too much, ever to listen to 
Foreign intriguers. George the Third also, with 
all his faults, was at heart a patriot ; and though 
he was far too much inclined to draw a line 
between his court and his government, though 
he was only too ready to accept no ministers but 
such as were personally agreeable to himself, 
and were the mere instruments of his individual 
prepossessions, he never, through any predilection 
for other sovereigns, thwarted a Secretary of 
State for Foreign Affairs in measures of public 
policy. The same praise cannot be given to 
George the Fourth. This sovereign did not 
hesitate to let France know that Canning was 
not agreeable to him, and secretly to encourage 
the French invasion, against which his minister 
protested, and which he himself publicly con- 
demned. George the Fourth had the baseness 
to tell Count Marcellus, the French Charge 
d' Affaires, privately, that he was unalterably on 
the same side as M. Chateaubriand and the 
Bourbons, and that he highly disapproved of the 
policy of his Ministry. The enlightened King 

G 4 



88 FOREIGN POLICY. 

of England believed that Mr. Canning and the 
Duke of Wellington were Radicals, because they 
would not sanction this outrage on national in- 
dependence. The historian recently quoted, 
who on this subject servilely copies page after 
page of M. de Lamartine's Histoire de laRestaur- 
ation, and whose horror of innovation is so well 
known, cannot see the impropriety and the 
danger of the sovereign having one policy, and 
his ministry another. But this is an innovation 
perhaps quite as alarming as a Reform Bill. This 
author might have found that the objectionable 
nature of such conduct on the part of a monarch, 
could be illustrated even in the annals of the 
French Revolution. The double policy of Louis 
the Fifteenth and his courtiers powerfully con- 
tributed, as Burke clearly showed, to bring the 
French Government into contempt, and to pro- 
duce the terrible social and political convulsion, 
about which this writer has compiled so many 
thousand pages. But it is plain that the un- 
pardonable sin of Canning in the eyes of this 
enlightened political historian and historical 
politician is, that he recalled the better days of 
our history, and did not think it sufficient to 
follow humbly in the track of the Holy Alliance. 
This writer adopts that childish and absurd 
character of Canning, which Count Marcellus 
derived from George the Fourth and his flat- 



CANNING AS A STATESMAN. 89 

terers, and which seemed so true to that select 
band of French legitimatists, who saw nothing in 
the aspect of the political world, but the certain 
signs of an untroubled future for the old mon- 
archy. But he quite forgets to mention the 
account which Marcellus gives of the British 
statesman's indignation on perusing the French 
king's speech to the Chambers, and his memor- 
able prophecy of the results of such infatuated 
policy. That prophecy has been literally ful- 
filled. No despatch brought from the archives 
of diplomacy ever exhibited any minister in a 
more glorious light than this letter of Marcellus.* 
Every Englishman must feel proud of the man 
who had the courage and the wisdom to tell 
such unquestionable truths to the foolish wor- 
shippers of legitimacy, and give to a neighbour- 
ing sovereign such an emphatic warning. This 
epistle also proves how earnest our minister was 
in his resistance to the French invasion, and 
how precisely the same were the sentiments he 
privately expressed to the French plenipotentiary 
with those he delivered in the British Parliament. 
When Canning read that passage of the speech 
in which it was declared that the just uneasiness 
of France would be dispelled, if Ferdinand were 
at liberty to give his people free institutions, 

* Politique de la Restauration en 1822-3. Par le Comte 
de Marcellus, Ancien Ministre Plenipotentiaire. 



90 FOREIGN POLICY. 

which could only emanate from himself ; in the 
presence of the astonished Marcellus, who little 
anticipated the effect such a sentence would 
produce, he waved the document above his head 
and gloriously exclaimed, " Miserable axiom ! a 
king free ! Do you know of one who deserves 
to be free ? I doubt indeed if he ever ought to 
be free. Do you think that I should be the 
minister of George the Fourth if his choice were 
free ? Do you suppose he can forget that I 
invariably avoided the orgies of his youth — that 
I always opposed his tastes and his favourites ? 
He hates me for my opposition, for my political 
attitude, and above all — and here I tell you 
nothing new— on account of old recollections of 
his domestic life." And a night's reflection on 
the imprudence of the king's speech, only made 
the avowal of the sentiments expressed in this 
address from the throne to the French Chambers, 
appear more alarming to the English Secretary 
of State. On the conversation being renewed 
the next day, he said deliberately, as he fixed 
his fine eyes beaming with generous and pa- 
triotic enthusiasm on the devout adorer of mon- 
archical authority : " Listen to me : this example 
may spread even to France. You cannot be 
ignorant that a deviation from the dogma of 
legitimacy, almost similar to what occurred in 
England, is being meditated at this very moment 



CANNING AS A STATESMAN. 91 

in France. You know the progress it has made 
in the ranks of an opposition supposed to be 
moderate. The head to be crowned is ready." 

We have reason to thank Count Marcellus for 
such revelations. They must increase, if any- 
thing could, the veneration with which Canning's 
memory is regarded. Ministers of state have 
before now thought it not unworthy of them 
to say one thing to a foreign ambassador, and 
another, for the sake of appearances, to the 
British Parliament. Against such disgraceful 
conduct it is well that Canning's example 
should be set off, and that our countrymen, as 
they pass his statue near Westminster Abbey, 
should, amid all difficulties and dangers, have 
assurance that they behold the image of a wise, 
brave, and conscientious Foreign Secretary. 

He died prematurely, and had a mighty nation 
for his mourners. But he had accomplished that 
which he had been sent to do. He had be- 
queathed his example to his followers, and even 
to his enemies. The race of political vampires, 
who fatten on corruption, and exult over the 
graves of brave nations, had shrunk away at the 
approach of his meridian glory. The iniquities 
of the Congress of Vienna began to be confessed. 
As the eyes of the people opened, they asked 
themselves what they had really gained by their 
glorious victories, and what sort of men were 



92 FOREIGN POLICY. 

those, who in their name professed to make and 
unmake kingdoms, to barter away the rights of 
millions, and to subsidise the armies of sovereigns, 
who mystically proclaimed a crusade against 
those eternal principles which had made Eng- 
land great and Englishmen free. 

But, while heartily doing justice to Canning's 
great merits, his errors must not be passed over. 
His intervention in Greece was imprudent. One 
of the last public acts of his life was to agree 
to the memorable treaty of the 6th of July 1827, 
which involved his country in great difficulties. 
That Canning was outwitted by Russia, when 
he thus embroiled England with the Porte, the 
famous despatches of Lieven, Pozzo di Borgo, 
and Nesselrode, afford indubitable testimony. 
The generous statesman, who, by his liberal 
policy, so ably circumvented Russia in the 
West, fell into the snare which she set for 
him, and became her tool in the East. The 
man who gave the death stab to the Holy Al- 
liance, put the Sultan in the power of the Czar. 

His sympathies for the struggling Greeks 
overpowered the foresight of the statesman. 
But the consequences of this policy were not 
seen until after Canning was sleeping peacefully 
in his grave, and other actors occupied the 
bustling ministerial stage. 



93 



CHAP. IV. 

THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON AND THE EARL OF ABERDEEN. 

POLICY OF THE WELLINGTON ADMINISTRATION. RESULT 

OF THE TREATY OF JULY 6. 1827. PUBLIC OPINION 

IN 1829. THE WHIGS AND TURKEY. TREATY OF 

ADRIANOPLE. THE SECRET CORRESPONDENCE. 

For some months after Canning's death there 
was really no government. His friends nomi- 
nally occupied the great offices of state, and 
the routine business of each department was 
transacted ; but there was no head of the ad- 
ministration, and the worst effects of this ab- 
sence of a great responsible chief was soon 
evident. An English fleet in conjunction with 
,.those of Russia and France, sailed into the port 
of Navarino, and without any declaration of 
hostilities, destroyed nearly all the effective 
marine of an ally for whom we had professed 
the most friendly intentions, and against whom 
we were certainly not at war. The Turkish 
navy never recovered the effect of that blow. 
Of the victory of Navarino, at once unjust and 
impolitic, England is at this day paying the 



94 FOREIGN POLICY. 

penalty. Such was the foreign policy of what, 
by courtesy, must be called the government of 
Lord Goderich. Such was the disastrous effect 
of not having clear and defined objects, when 
fleets are sent forth to strengthen the remon- 
strances of the diplomatist. 

At home, the want of foresight was as remark- 
able as in the intervention in Turkish affairs 
abroad. As soon as the time for the meeting 
of Parliament approached, and it was absolutely 
necessary to decide on the measures for the 
session, the members of the cabinet found out that 
their only agreement was in a common aversion. 
Even the Chancellor of the Exchequer was not 
consulted on the appointment of a committee on 
finance ; he very naturally felt indignant ; 
explanations only showed how little harmony 
existed among such discordant colleagues; one 
resignation produced another, and the govern- 
ment was broken up. 

The Duke of Wellington then took the office 
of First Lord of the Treasury. Some of Can- 
ning's friends who continued in office were soon 
compelled to resign, and the Earl of Aber- 
deen, for the first time, became Secretary of 
State for Foreign Affairs. The influence of 
the Duke of Wellington on the foreign policy 
of England has been very great ; it is from him 






WELLINGTON AND CANNING. 95 

that the Earl of Aberdeen avowedly derived 
those leading principles which have distinguished 
his ministerial career, and have especially marked 
his dealings with other nations. 

The same writers who delight in describing 
the policies of Aberdeen and Palmerston as 
decidedly different, draw the same distinction 
between the policies of Wellington and Can- 
ning. If not correct in their opinions, these 
critics are at least consistent ; but a little con- 
sideration will show that the positive difference 
between the two earlier statesmen was as il- 
lusory as that between the two ministers who 
have so powerfully impressed their character on 
the European history of the last twenty-six 
years. 

I There is not the slightest reason for believing 
th'&t the Duke of Wellington disapproved of 
Canning's foreign policy. It was the Duke who 
was the plenipotentiary at Yerona ; it was the 
Duke who went to Russia to negotiate the just 
interference of the powers between Greece and 
Turkey ; it was the Duke who signed the pro- 
tocol of St. Petersburg, which settled the 
grounds of intervention. To suppose that he 
was the unwilling agent in these important 
negotiations, and that he secretly disapproved 
of the memorials to which he deliberately set 



96 FOREIGN POLICY. 

his hand and seal, is monstrous. Of all men he 
was least likely to act the dishonest part of 
expressing one set of sentiments in public and 
another in private. He was ever frank and 
manly in the avowal of his opinions. Conscious 
of the great position he filled in the eyes of the 
world, he disdained to use the paltry artifices of 
the ordinary diplomatist. He never asserted 
that any measure of foreign policy was the cause 
of his refusal to take office under Canning. If 
he and his friends had had such a good excuse 
for their ungenerous conduct, it would certainly 
have been made ; but that no such good reason 
was ever given or even hinted at, is a proof that 
it never existed. He was, in fact, determined 
to be Prime Minister, and Peel, who was rather 
jealous of Canning, and had resolved not to serve 
under him, did all he could to encourage the Duke 
in his pretensions. Again, when Mr. Huskisson, 
Lord Dudley, Lord Melbourne and Lord Palmer- 
ston retired from the Wellington administration, 
it was never alleged that any quarrel had arisen 
on the foreign policy of the cabinet ; their re- 
signations were caused by a vote on a domestic 
question, and by the pride and firmness of the 
martial Prime Minister, who, after having once 
found himself secure in his office, thought that he 
could do without the Canningites, and would 



WELLINGTON AND ABERDEEN. 97 

not permit his own ascendancy to be questioned. 
He was not prepared to be a nominal chief like 
Lord Liverpool or Lord Goderich. He was 
determined that Mr. Huskisson should not treat 
him as he had a few months before treated Mr. 
Herries. Hence the ministerial advocate of liberal 
commercial principles found, to his astonishment, 
that as soon as his resignation was sent in, it 
was accepted, and that all his humiliating 
apologies could not induce the Duke to ask him 
to remain in office. Wellington's decision was 
not perhaps so wise as it was brave; the expelled 
ministers were men whom no administration 
could well spare ; but it is only necessary to 
establish fully that there was not the slightest 
disagreement on foreign policy when Lord 
Palmerston resigned the office of Secretary at 
War, and Lord Aberdeen accepted that of 
Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. Whatever 
differences there may have been on external 
policy between the administration of Wellington 
and that of the succeeding Whig governments, 
they arose more from the dispositions of the respec- 
tive statesmen than from any decided principle. 
The Duke was emphatically a soldier. His 
temperament was thoroughly martial. His 
varied experiences in Ireland, India, and the 
Peninsula, had made him regard with no 

H 



98 FOREIGN POLICY. 

favourable eyes mere popular assemblies. He 
cared little for human rights; it was enough for 
him that men had duties. He had not only an 
English but a European character. A natu- 
ralised Spaniard, covered with the orders of the 
great nations of the Continent, holding a rank 
in their armies, the personal friend of their 
sovereigns, the Captain- General of the army of 
occupation, the acknowledged restorer of legiti- 
mate thrones, it is not surprising that his sym- 
pathies were on the side of the established 
monarchies. He looked generally at the means 
of making governments strong, and thought not 
much of what was abstractedly just. His great 
victory was proverbially a king-making victory. 
His glory was associated with the order of things 
settled at the Congress of Vienna. Eloquent 
declamations in favour of human freedom never 
kindled his enthusiasm. Perhaps he experienced 
a feeling of contempt for the brilliant orators in 
the British Parliament, some of whom had done 
all they could to discourage England from pro- 
secuting the war which he brought to such a 
glorious termination. Even the " liberty of 
unlicensed printing," which has been the theme 
of so many glowing periods, he regarded with 
no peculiar admiration. He thought of the time 
when the generals opposed to him learnt all his 



Wellington's policy. 99 

plans from the "rascally newspapers" which 
ministered to the patriotic curiosity of his 
countrymen, whose battles he was sternly 
fighting. Of the power of Russia in particular, 
he felt little jealousy ; he believed that a Russian 
alliance was highly beneficial to England, and 
frequently expressed much confidence in the 
wisdom and moderation of the Czar. 

This was one side of the Duke's political cha- 
racter. But by itself it would give a very 
erroneous and extremely unjust view of him as a 
statesman superintending the foreign policy of 
England. He was at heart a patriot. That 
sentiment of duty which was so strong in him, 
made him spurn the idea of ever separating 
himself from the true interest of the empire in 
order to gratify the rulers whom he had so 
much obliged, and who so highly praised him. 
Conservative as he was on questions of domestic 
policy, he became a Liberal when the honour of 
England abroad was concerned. Like the great 
English admiral in the time of the Common- 
wealth, he considered that his first duty was to 
serve his country whoever might for the moment 
be at the head of affairs, and whatever might be 
the form of the government. Like Blake, he 
would have fought as earnestly against a 
monarchy as against a republic. The enemies 

H 2 



100 FOKEIGN POLICY. 

of England, wherever they might be found, and 
whatever might be their professed principles, 
were his enemies. No party politician could 
say, that the mission he undertook to Verona, 
under the direction of Canning, was less effect- 
ually performed because he was on such good 
terms with the principal supporters of the Holy 
Alliance. Nor, though he thought the friendship 
of Russia worth cultivating, and had even a pre- 
ference for the Great Northern Power, did he 
ever lend himself to her designs on Turkey, nor 
hesitate to declare that it was the interest and 
the duty of England to oppose such encroach- 
ments. We may be well assured that in spite of 
the blandishments of the present Czar, the remem- 
brance of his friendship with Alexander, and all 
his Russian prepossessions, had the Duke of 
Wellington been alive at this day and able to 
lead the armies of England, he would, at the 
command of his sovereign, as readily and cheer- 
fully have drawn his sword against Nicholas as 
he did against Napoleon. 

But the great soldier is dead. The most 
malignant partisans have now no motive for 
misrepresenting his efforts for the advancement 
of England. His friendly feelings towards 
Russia may be admitted without any imputation 
being cast upon his patriotic integrity. The 



THE EARL OF ABERDEEN. 101 

eminent man who, under his auspices, became 
Foreign Minister in 1828, is still alive, to be the 
mark of all the poisoned arrows which disap- 
pointed faction may let fly at his grey hairs. 

Since the disruption of the Tory party in con- 
sequence of the adoption of free-trade principles 
by Sir Eobert Peel, the Earl of Aberdeen has 
been peculiarly obnoxious to those politicians 
who for some years longer professed themselves 
Protectionists. They knew that this distin- 
guished nobleman was one of the firmest sup- 
porters of their former chief. They knew that 
since Sir Kobert's death, the Foreign Secretary 
of the Peel government was considered as the 
respected and conscientious adviser of that states- 
man's political disciples. They knew that though 
seldom inclined to distinguish himself by displays 
of oratory in Parliament, Lord Aberdeen's expe- 
rience, integrity, and judgment were of immense 
weight in council. It was to him that they 
ascribed the little confidence which the most in- 
fluential statesman of their own party placed in 
the administration of Lord Derby ; and, there- 
fore, since he was chosen Prime Minister of 
the Coalition, he has been singled out for 
the invectives of the Opposition. Their object 
was to conciliate Lord Palmerston, whose foreign 
policy they thought fit to praise most loudly; and 

H 3 



102 FOREIGN POLICY. 

they began to condemn, in no measured terms, 
that continental system of which they considered 
Lord Aberdeen the representative. It is never- 
theless a fact, somewhat unfortunate to the sin- 
cerity of those Conservative censors of the Prime 
Minister's foreign policy, but necessary to be 
remembered by the truthful historian, that it was 
not until Lord Aberdeen assisted Sir Eobert Peel 
in repealing the Corn Laws, and lost the support 
of the Protectionists, that they ever raised their 
voices against his manner of conducting the busi- 
ness of the Foreign Office. It was not until they 
quarrelled with him on a domestic question that 
they ever blamed him for his foreign policy, and 
began to admire that of Lord Palmerston. 
During the administration of the Duke of 
Wellington, from 1828 to the November of 1830, 
and during the administration of Sir Robert Peel 
from 1841 to 1846, — that is, during all the time 
when Lord Aberdeen was Secretary of State for 
Foreign Affairs, — the vehement partisans on the 
benches of the Opposition were the most de- 
termined supporters and the most enthusiastic 
admirers of the very minister whom they now 
reprobate. The extreme Liberals, who always 
thought Lord Aberdeen too indulgent towards 
the despotic Sovereigns of the Continent, may, 
consistently, still continue to oppose him ; but it 



lord Aberdeen's foreign policy. 103 

is not for those who supported Sir Robert Peel 
and the Duke of Wellington now to turn round 
and denounce Lord Aberdeen for betraying the 
freedom of nations. 

Some of these reproaches are as ignorant and 
as unscrupulous as they are unjust. It can easily 
be proved that Lord Aberdeen never had that 
violent attachment to Russia which has been 
attributed to him, and that his leaning object 
while Foreign Minister was to encourage Austria 
in maintaining her independence of her northern 
neighbour. Events indeed, have been more 
powerful than the efforts of the English states- 
man; but it is due to him to own that while 
Austria maintained a free course of action, the 
ambitious schemes of Russia were in some mea- 
sure frustrated, and the Turkish Empire pre- 
served from direct attack. 

He has indeed ever been friendly to an Aus- 
trian alliance. It was in Austria that he won a 
great diplomatic victory, when he induced that 
country to join the confederacy against Napoleon. 
All who could judge of the difficulties he over- 
came at that time, have borne testimony to the 
able manner in which he conducted that impor- 
tant negotiation. This is not the place to dwell 
on his career as a diplomatist, or it might easily 
be shown what good service he did to Austria, 

H 4) 



104 FOREIGN POLICY. 

and how natural it was that he should have 
friendly, sympathies with the ablest statesman of 
that empire. It might even be shown that some 
of the arbitrary proceedings of the Court of 
Vienna, which were at once so impolitic and un- 
just, and which have produced so much misery 
to Austria and the world, were deeply regretted 
by Lord Aberdeen, and that he did all he could 
to prevent them from being adopted. 

He never was a Tory of the school of Sid- 
mouth and Perceval. A nobleman of a highly 
cultivated intellect, distinguished in his youth 
by a love of literature, his mind enlarged by 
foreign travel, it is not going too far to say 
that he heartily despised the cant and bigotry 
so prevalent in the first quarter of this cen- 
tury, and that there were some very respect- 
able politicians who considered him rather a 
dangerous Liberal. He never approved of the 
Holy Alliance. In his place in Parliament he 
declared, while Lord Castlereagh was still Foreign 
Minister, that such confederacies of monarchs 
were to be watched with the greater jealousy, 
because the system was liable to so much abuse, 
that it could not be too strongly condemned. On 
the Koman Catholic question his ideas were still 
more liberal. He ever proclaimed himself fa- 
vourable to it, though he thought, most charac- 



lord Aberdeen's character. 105 

teristically, that the repeal of the disabilities 
would not produce all the good which the Whig 
orators so frequently prophesied. He has the 
national character of the Scotchman. The Duke 
of Wellington himself was not more phlegmatic 
in temperament or less inclined to indulge in any 
fervid emotions. Lord Aberdeen is not, nor 
ever was, an orator. Before he was Foreign 
Secretary he seldom thought of addressing the 
House of Lords; his talents for debate were 
never developed as those of many eminent 
persons have been, in the more exciting atmo- 
sphere of the House of Commons. Whenever he 
thought fit to rise to address the Lords, he ut- 
tered a few pregnant sentences in an unpretend- 
ing manner, with the air of one who spoke from 
necessity, and delivered his honest and matured 
sentiments. Few as his words were, they pro- 
duced an effect; his opinions were always thought 
deserving of attention. 

There is not the slightest reason for supposing 
that he disapproved of Canning's foreign policy. 
He did not join in any opposition when the 
accomplished statesman was First Lord of the 
Treasury. His conduct at that time was per- 
haps more upright and intelligible than that of 
either the " Protestant " ministers who retired 
from office, or the Whig politicians who ac- 



106 FOREIGN POLICY. 

cepted place under Canning. In the only 
speech he made during this short administra- 
tion, Lord Aberdeen said, that he belonged to 
no opposition, "factious or otherwise ;" that he 
had always been in favour of Eoman Catholic 
emancipation ; that the only reason why he could 
not place entire confidence in the Government, 
was because this measure had not been made a 
cabinet question ; that he thought the manner in 
which the Whigs who had joined the ministry 
had agreed to temporise with this great plan of 
relief which they thought so necessary, was 
injurious to the fair and honourable character of 
public men, and that the reputation of our 
statesmen was of more importance than even 
the removal of religious disabilities. There are 
persons so ill-informed and so blinded by party- 
spirit, as to charge Lord Aberdeen with the 
disasters of Navarino and the unfortunate results 
of the war with Russia which so much exhausted 
the strength of the Ottoman Empire. He acted 
just the contrary to what is implied in the pre- 
sumptuous charges of his accusers. He was not 
in office when the battle of Navarino was de- 
cided, {The first act of Lord Aberdeen as 
Foreign Secretary was to aid the Porte, and he 
was as much attacked by the Opposition of that 
day for saying that it was our duty to support 



THE WHIGS AND TURKEY. 107 

the independence of Turkey, as he has lately 
been accused of being ready to consent to the 
partition of the Sultan's dominions. 
I It is forgotten that this violent sympathy for 
the Turkish cause is of a very recent date. 
Among Liberal politicians especially, it is only 
within the last few years that the existence of 
Turkey has ever been admitted to be a political 
necessity. The statesmen of the last gene- 
ration, with perhaps the exception of William 
Pitt, utterly detested the Turkish Government. 
Even Burke, with all his eloquent wisdom, his 
sagacious jealousy of Russia, and his abhorrence 
of the partition of Poland, hated the Turks as 
much as he hated Warren Hastings and the 
Jacobins. He called them a race of savages and 
worse than savages, and said that any minister 
who allowed them to be of any weight in the 
European system, deserved the curses of pos- 
terity. It is only since the settlement of Europe 
in 1815, which so firmly established the power 
of Russia, and undermined every other throne on 
the Continent, that the importance of Turkey has 
been seen. ) Because we now witness the singular 
spectacle or the two most enlightened nations of 
Europe going to war, with the approbation of 
every sincere and wise friend of freedom and 
civilisation, for the purpose of keeping the Turks 



108 FOREIGN POLICY. 

at Constantinople, the loss of which by the 
Greeks was four centuries ago considered the 
most grievous calamity that ever befell Chris- 
tendom, some sanguine spirits forget how very 
recently this policy has been decided upon, and 
are ready to denounce Lord Aberdeen as a traitor 
for not supporting the policy which he really 
originated. The readers of some journals will 
think it an incredible paradox to assert that it 
was Lord Aberdeen who first as Foreign Secre- 
tary proclaimed it to be the duty of England to 
maintain the independence and the integrity of 
the Turkish Empire. Nevertheless such is the 
fact ; and a very little reflection will place it 
beyond dispute. 

It is only fair to Burke, and those who until 
lately execrated the Ottoman rule, to acknow- 
ledge that when they called the Turks barbarous, 
they had many of the vices of barbarians. They 
were always brave, they were always in a certain 
sense generous ; but they have not often been 
merciful ; and for centuries their yoke has been 
heavy on the Christians. Even the reforms and 
ameliorations which have been urged on the 
government of the Sultan are contrary to the 
spirit of the Mahometan religion, and the pre- 
cepts of the Koran. When the Turk becomes a 
political and religious liberal, he ceases to be a 



TURKISH CHARACTER. 109 

Turk. He may or he may not develope into 
something better ; but it is certain that on the 
day he is enlightened into a reformer, after the 
fashion of English ten-pound electors, the old 
national heart, that once beat so proudly, must die 
within him, and that neither the tricolor nor the 
union-jack in which he may wrap himself, after 
he has divested himself of the garb and colours 
of the Prophet, can ever bring him to life again 
as a genuine Mussulman. In his chrysalis state 
he may look much more amiable than in his 
pristine condition. We may consider Abdul 
Medjid as a friend ; we could only look on 
Mahomet the Second as a foe. The wisdom of 
Providence has in this, as in other cases, con- 
verted what was regarded as a curse into a 
blessing. If, when Constantinople fell, many 
earnest Christians wept over it as over the fall 
of a second Jerusalem, the healing influence of 
time has done much for Europe ; and there can 
be no doubt that we should now with as much 
reason regret the fall of Constantinople into the 
hands of the Cossack, as our ancestors formerly 
bewailed its possession by the Turk. True 
policy teaches us to put up with the evils we 
have been accustomed to, rather than blindly to 
rush into those we have not experienced. The 
Turkish yoke is now at least endurable ; but we 



110 FOBEIGN POLICY. 

must not forget that if statesmen in former days 
would not tolerate it, it is only in our time that 
it has become tolerable. 

Thirty years ago this revolution in the Turkish 
Empire had begun. The work of innovation 
was, however, still rude and unfashioned. Eng- 
lish Liberals would not believe in it ; instead of 
regenerating Turkey, they were bent on raising 
another nation of real old Greek heroes from the 
soil of the Peloponnesus. Thus were the wrongs 
of Europe to be redressed ; the age of Pericles 
was to be revived; we were in this nineteenth 
century to behold the glories of a liberal Athens 
with her warriors, statesmen, and philosophers. 
These were the visions of many Englishmen; but 
they were not the visions of the Emperor of 
Eussia. The English Whigs and the Czar were 
both bent on wresting Greece from Turkey, and 
doing all the harm they could to the Sultan. 
An English Liberal is the most credulous of 
politicians. The manner in which the Emperor 
Nicholas made use of the democratic fervour of 
our countrymen for the purpose of striking a 
deadly blow at Turkey, is marvellous. Blind 
and unreflecting, we never calculated conse- 
quences, or looked to the future. The Treaty of 
July, 1827, by which the interference of the 
Three Powers was decided, was, as events 



RESULT OF THE TREATY OF 1827. Ill 

proved, extremely impolitic. Had Canning 
lived to superintend the operations of the Allies, 
the result might have been different ; but as it 
was, it produced the battle of Navarino. 

For six years the hostilities between the Turks 
and the Greeks had continued. For six years 
the Great Powers had professed their neutrality. 
For six years Kussia anxiously watched her 
opportunity, and almost believed that the dis- 
solution of the Ottoman Empire was at hand. 
She knew well that if the Greeks achieved their 
independence without the aid of France or Eng- 
land, as long as the Turks remained in Europe 
that independence would be merely nominal ; 
that a kingdom of Greece would be entirely 
dependent upon herself, and that a Greek state 
would be a powerful lever by which all the Greek 
brethren in Turkey might be moved at will, and 
the Turkish Empire demolished at any moment. 
To the surprise of Nicholas, and to the dismay 
of the Whigs in England, Greek patriotism 
showed itself at length not so powerful as they 
supposed ; the energy of the Turkish com- 
manders was gradually subduing the insurgents, 
and the authority of the Sultan was once more 
being recognised throughout the Morea. Pro- 
fessions of neutrality were immediately thrown 
to the winds. The Czar determined to interfere, 



112 FOREIGN POLICY. 

and he would have been glad to have inter- 
fered alone. This could not be done without 
hazarding a rupture with England. The Duke 
of Wellington's influence prevailed, and a com- 
mon intervention was agreed upon, especially 
for the purpose of preserving peace. In the 
name of peace the Three Powers made war on 
a friendly state, destroyed its armaments, and 
insisted upon the withdrawal of its garri- 
sons. But this was not all. When the Turkish 
armies had become victorious in all parts of 
the Morea, after the Greek armies had been 
defeated, Missolonghi and Athens taken, and 
the Crescent was everywhere triumphant, the 
allied fleets arrived at the scene of action, and 
checked the operations of the Turkish com- 
manders. The object for which the govern- 
ments professed to interfere was not accom- 
plished ; for instead of peace being preserved, 
as soon as Nicholas saw what a loss the Turks 
had sustained, he hastily separated himself from 
the other mediating powers, and a disastrous 
war with Eussia followed the disastrous battle 
of Navarino. 

As we now look calmly at that naval conflict, 
we are shocked at the injustice and the hypocrisy 
of the allies. We sympathise fully with that 
sentence in the King's speech which declared it 



PUBLIC OPINION IN 1829. 113 

an " untoward event.'' Neither the Government 
of France nor of England really approved of 
the victory which their fleets had gained ; and 
by all sagaqious politicians the result was deeply 
regretted. ) 

But the /English Opposition thought very dif- 
ferently. They were indignant that the Duke of 
Wellington should have considered the affair of 
Navarino as untoward ; they were indignant 
that Turkey should have been called an ancient 
ally ; Sultan Mahmoud was classed in their de- 
clamations with the tyrants of the Continent ; 
and they bitterly reproached the ministers for 
declaring that it was necessary to maintain the 
Turkish Empire. At the meeting of Parliament 
in 1828, Lord Holland, who always spoke with 
much dogmatism on foreign affairs, could 
scarcely find words to express his horror at any 
expression of sympathy for the Ottoman Empire, 
and enthusiastically defended the battle of Na- 
varino. The Liberal members of the House of 
Commons went quite as far as the Whig peers in 
their detestation of Turkey, and in their want of 
sympathy for her wrongs. Mr. Brougham de- 
clared that the battle of Navarino was a glorious, 
a brilliant, a decisive, an immortal achievement ; 
and even Lord John Kussell thought it as honest 

I 



1 14 FOKEIGN POLICY. 

a victory as bad ever been gained from the 
beginning of the world. 

The success of Kussia in the campaign of 
1829, did not in the slightest degree alarm the 
illustrious politicians of the Opposition, nor in- 
duce them to soften their hatred to Turkey. 
The more it became necessary to put a stop to 
the progress of Kussia, the more the Whigs 
condemned Lord Aberdeen and the Duke of 
Wellington for endeavouring to save the Otto- 
man Empire. The ministers were far from 
pleased at the consequences of the policy which 
they inherited. The Duke said that it was 
Canning who had settled the basis of our inter- 
ference with Greece ; but when he or his col- 
leagues ventured at any time to doubt of its 
wisdom, Lord Holland accused them of not 
sympathising with liberal opinions, and of 
wishing to see the triumph of despotism. 

At the beginning of the session of 1830, when 
the feebleness of Turkey and the ambition of 
Eussia had been so plainly demonstrated, even 
Lord Holland, had he deserved the title of a 
statesman, might have been expected to see 
whose game he was playing. The people had 
taken the alarm as soon as the news arrived that 
the line of the Balkan had been forced, and that 
a Russian army was marching on Adrianople. 



THE WHIGS AND TURKEY. 115 

Rumours of strange import had also been spread 
abroad. It was whispered that a secret compact 
had been concluded between the King of France 
and the Emperor of Russia, by which the Bour- 
bons were to extend their dominions to the Rhine, 
and Nicholas to occupy Constantinople. 

It was at such a momentous crisis that our 
legislators assembled for the parliamentary 
season. Even then the eyes of Lord Holland 
and the Whigs were not opened. This noble- 
man attacked Lord Aberdeen, not for des- 
troying but for saving Turkey ; not for per- 
suading the Sultan to agree to the treaty of 
Adrianople, but for not permitting the Czar to 
take all the Turkish Empire. " As a citizen of 
the world," said Lord Holland, " I am sorry that 
the Russians have not taken Constantinople." 
The Duke of Wellington expressed himself 
strongly on the importance and the duty of 
upholding Turkey ; and Lord Aberdeen reminded 
Lord Holland that Mr. Fox had also been of the 
same opinion. The Whigs were angry with the 
Foreign Secretary for asserting that their fa- 
vourite leader ever thought of opposing the 
designs of Russia or of supporting Turkey. Lord 
Holland in the House of Lords, and Lord John 
Russell in the House of Commons, both pointedly 
denied that Mr. Fox ever held such a notion. 



116 FOREIGN POLICY. 

When such were the ideas of the principal 
statesmen of the Opposition, it is too much now 
for writers to turn round and blame Lord Aber- 
deen for having been the friend of the Czar. 
The Russians had almost reached the suburbs of 
Constantinople ; the Turks had neither a fleet nor 
an army to oppose to the hosts of Nicholas ; their 
strongest fortresses were occupied by Russian 
garrisons ; the Ottoman Empire was on the verge 
of ruin ; instead of wondering that Turkey lost 
so much by the treaty of Adrianople, we may be 
thankful that she did not lose her all. The past 
must not be judged by the present. We are now 
unanimous on the justice of the war against 
Russia, and in favour of Turkey. But had Lord 
Aberdeen and the Duke of Wellington declared 
war in 1829 in defence of Turkey, they would 
have been strongly opposed by a more formidable 
section of liberal politicians than ever resisted 
Pitt when he commenced hostilities against the 
French republicans. Yet with public opinion 
but partially in their favour, the ministers coura- 
geously contemplated hostilities. It is indispu- 
table that the administration of the Duke of 
Wellington never would have permitted the 
Russian battalions to enter Constantinople ; that 
they had come to an agreement with Austria to 
oppose the advance of the Czar, and that they 



THE TREATY OF ADRIANOPLE. 117 

had ordered the English admiral, if all means of 
pacification failed, to seize the Russian fleet in 
the Mediterranean. This they did in the face of 
the Opposition. This they did when religious 
fanaticism, popular prejudices, and liberal enthu- 
siasm were all against the cause of the Sultan. 
It is therefore not without reason that Lord 
Aberdeen lately put in his claim to have written 
and done as much in opposition to Russia as any 
English statesman. 

It may be true that the Russian troops that 
had reached Adrianople were in a critical po- 
sition. It may be true, as facts which have 
since been brought to light seem to indicate, that 
even the invading army was much weaker than 
it was believed to be, and that it was suffering 
severely from privation and disease. But peace 
was absolutely necessary at that time for Turkey. 
Had the war continued two or three years longer, 
even though the Turks had been able to meet 
the Russians in the field, the Ottoman Empire 
must have fallen to pieces. It was completely 
exhausted. The long struggle with Greece, the 
innovations in the administration, the destruction 
of the janissaries, the anarchy and discontent of 
the provinces, the loss of the fleet at Navarino, 
the blockade of the Dardanelles, the fall of the 
great fortresses both in European and Asiatic 

i 3 



118 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Turkey, the defeat of every army with the ex- 
ception of a single force of about twenty thousand 
men under the command of a disobedient pasha, 
had produced a state of almost hopeless weakness 
and absolute prostration. The Russian armies 
were flushed with victory ; however great their 
losses they could have been easily repaired ; and 
with the command of the Black Sea, Yarn a, and 
the eastern passes of the Balkan, it is scarcely 
possible to imagine any obstacle to the certain 
triumph of Nicholas. The power of Austria was 
indeed great, but it was counterbalanced by that 
of France ; England was not in such a condition 
to engage in a great war as she now is ; and the 
strength even of the Turks themselves has since 
been recruited. 

With Prussia and France favourable to Russia, 
how could Lord Aberdeen have acted otherwise 
than he did? His hands were tied behind him. 
As it was, Russia acquired by the treaty of Adri- 
anople no extension of her dominions in Europe, 
with the exception of the islands at the mouth 
of the Danube. It is true that this was an 
acquisition which gave to Russia a control over 
the commercial interests of Germany, and 
indeed of all Europe. But if Prince Metternich, 
the Austrian Minister who has ever been so 
jealous of the approach of Russia to Constanti- 



THE TREATY OF ADRIANOPLE. 119 

nople, who attempted to induce all Europe to 
join in an alliance in support of Turkey, and 
whose policy it has been systematically to 
oppose the aggrandisement of Russia, per- 
mitted the Czar to obtain the mouths of the 
Danube, Lord Aberdeen cannot very well be 
blamed for submitting to a necessity which he 
was powerless to resist. People write and speak 
now, as though our ministers, without going to 
war, could have made Russia, in that moment of 
victory, accept any terms they might have been 
pleased to prescribe. 

When it is considered in what a miserable 
condition Turkey then was, how divided and 
hostile were all the nations of Europe, we may 
well wonder that Russia gained so little as she 
did by this much vilified treaty. It was not the 
Treaty of Adrianople which gave her the 
command of the Black Sea. It was not the 
Treaty of Adrianople which gave her the 
pretence of interfering with the Greek subjects 
of the Porte. To those who say that Russia 
ought to have accepted pecuniary compensation, 
and no increase of territory, it is sufficient to 
answer, that it is not what Russia ought, but 
what she would under the circumstances accept, 
that Lord Aberdeen had to consider. As it was, 
the extension of her limits was comparatively 

i 4 



120 FOREIGN POLICY. 

small ; and the money which the Sultan agreed 
to pay was beyond his resources. He was 
obliged afterwards to compound for a release 
from part of his pecuniary engagements by 
ceding some portion of his Asiatic possessions. 
If England had been prepared to declare war in 
the event of her pacific proposals being rejected, 
of course the question would now assume a very 
different form. But as peace at any price was then 
the cry of the Opposition ; as a war for Turkey 
would have been anything but a popular war; 
as the Czar was omnipotent, and other great 
European powers his humble admirers, no im- 
partial person, who fairly weighs all the diffi- 
culties of that time, can conscientiously declare 
that Lord Aberdeen did wrong in acquiescing in 
the Treaty of Adrianople. Those who eagerly 
demanded the independence of Greece, and 
insisted on the treaty of 1827, and not the unfor- 
tunate minister whose lot it was to attempt to 
remedy the injuries which that policy inflicted 
upon Turkey, are justly censurable. 

Mr. Canning did not foresee, when he agreed 
to that treaty, the troubles he was preparing for 
future governments, and the serious misfortunes 
impending over the Ottoman Empire Instead 
of preventing, it produced war, and afforded the 



THE SECRET CORRESPONDENCE. .121 

pretext for other wars. It almost ruined Turkey. 
It tasked the ability and patience of successive 
foreign secretaries, and after years of negotiation, 
the freedom of Greece was not securely esta- 
blished, anarchy and civil war existed, and the 
ministers of France, Russia, and England had 
not arrived at a definite conclusion. 

The fact must now be admitted, that the policy 
of Canning so far as it had reference to the 
affairs of Greece and Turkey, was gravely 
erroneous. Russia never supposed that peace 
would be the result of the intervention of the 
three Powers in the struggle between the Porte 
and the Greeks of the Peloponnesus. The 
Russian minister deliberately acceded to a pro- 
tocol which, while professing to maintain peace, 
he knew would be the cause of war. 

The Secret Correspondence places this matter 
beyond dispute. These despatches, said to have 
been taken from the archives of Warsaw, are 
unquestionably genuine. Neither Lord Aberdeen 
nor Lord Palmerston, men surely capable of 
forming a sound opinion on the subject, have 
ever suspected them to be false. It is utterly 
impossible that such documents, so full of the 
individuality of the various ministers to whom 
they were ascribed, and so luminiously revealing 
the policies of the European cabinets, could be 



122 FOREIGN POLICY. 

manufactured. They have the natural impress 
of truth. They treat familiarly of questions 
which none but those initiated into the mysteries 
of diplomacy, and thoroughly masters of the 
subject, could know. Had they been deceptions, 
a minister of any Court of Europe, or any 
one having access to the Foreign Office of 
England, could easily have proved them to be 
deceptions. That this has not been done, that 
they have repeatedly been quoted as autho- 
rities by leading politicians in Parliament, 
ought to convince even the most sceptical of 
understandings. One effect, indeed, which they 
should have had, they do not seem to have pro- 
duced. As they incontestably proved that a 
Russian Ambassador was a systematic impostor; 
that he did not hesitate to state deliberately that 
which he knew to be directly at variance with 
truth, to quiet the apprehensions of the court to 
which he was sent, it is surprising how ministers 
have, for many years after the publication of 
these letters, trusted to the professions of the 
Emperor Nicholas, and unhesitatingly declared 
their confidence in his friendly intentions towards 
Turkey and the whole world. 
C From 1826 to 1830, the more the integrity 
and independence of the Turkish Empire was 
threatened by the Emperor, the more did his 



THE SECRET CORRESPONDENCE. 123 

servants in Austria and England declare that the \ 
integrity and independence of Turkey was an 
object which he had sincerely at heart. The 
more resolutely war was made by the Russian 
generals, the more pacific were the declarations 
of the Russian ambassadors, jlf the forces of the 
Czar had entered Constantinople, there can be 
no doubt that the news of the occupation of that 
city would have reached Vienna and London a 
very short while after Count Krasinsky and 
Count Lieven had distinctly assured Prince 
Metternich and Lord Aberdeen that the troops 
of the disinterested and generous Emperor of 
Russia never had the slightest intention of 
intruding into the Sultan's capital, and that 
orders to retreat across the Danube had positively 
been sent to General Diebitsch from St. Peters- 
burg, If the news had been thoroughly authen- 
ticated, and explanations had been demanded, 
the Russian ambassador with a grave face would 
certainly have maintained that it had happened 
by mistake, and by mistake it would have been 
positively announced that Nicholas had himself 
awoke one fine morning and found himself in Con- 
stantinople. The game of deceit would still have 
been continued. This occupation of the metropolis 
of the Greek Empire would have been represented 
as only temporary : years, however, would have 



124 FOREIGN POLICY. 

elapsed, bale after bale of despatches would have 
been written, lie after lie would have been told ; 
and at length the Grand Duke Constantine, with 
the title of a Greek Emperor, would have been 
left on the shores of the Bosphorus as his father's 
viceroy. 

A careful perusal of a despatch of Count 
Lieven to Canning, clearly establishes that the 
only inducement for Russia to act with France 
and England was the hope that the Western 
Powers would be obliged to make common cause 
with her against Turkey, f War, not peace, des- 
potic selfishness, and not sympathy for an op- 
pressed people, were the motives which Russia 
entertained. The military reforms which the 
Sultan had energetically carried out, had given 
the greatest alarm to Russia, and whatever 
might be the violations of the conventions of 
Ackermann, and the alleged injuries which Rus- 
sian subjects had received, it was for the pur- 
pose of destroying, as Count Pozzo di Borgo 
plainly says, that physical and moral organi- 
sation which was in progress throughout the 
Turkish Empire, and which had never before 
been witnessed, that determined the Emperor 
upon war.* /It was necessary that a vital at- 

* Count Pozzo di Borgo to Count Nesselrocle, Nov. 28. 

1828. 



THE SECRET CORRESPONDENCE. 125 

tack should be made, while the work of inno- 
vation was yet crude, and the strength of the new 
system still immature. Count Lieven, even ven- 
tured, among other questions, to ask Canning, 
before the treaty of July the 6th was concluded, 
what would be the conduct of England, should 
the Sultan refuse to comply with the terms pro- 
posed by the mediating powers ?* The English 
minister, in a secret and confidential answer to 
this communication, passed by this important 
point, as one which he thought it " not essential 
to dwell upon." This was unwise. The contin- 
gency ought to have been foreseen, and distinctly 
provided for, before the treaty was irrevocably 
settled. In such important negotiations, nothing 
ought to be left to chance. Although they were 
pledged to act together, the English and Russian 
ministers had very opposite designs. What Can- 
ning innocently calls "a work of conciliation and 
peace," Count Nesselrode, with more sagacity, 
pronounces in this correspondence, to be " a 
crisis which must decide the future relations of 
Russia with the Ottoman Government."! Every 
measure which England took for the emanci- 
pation of Greece was impatiently welcomed by 



* Despatch of Nov. 7. 1826, 
15 

27 



f Despatch of Nov. |f. 1826. 



126 FOREIGN POLICY. 

the Russian statesman, who expressly says, that 
his object was to place England in a position 
from which she could not possibly retreat. We 
may well be surprised at the infatuation of our 
ministers, when they suffered themselves to be 
entangled in such designs. Prince Metternich 
distinctly declared, that the reason why he would 
not join in the treaty for securing the indepen- 
dence of Greece was, because he plainly foresaw 
that war would be the result. The battle of 
Navarino soon confirmed the sagacious prog- 
nostications of the Austrian statesman. He 
exerted himself indefatigably in the cause of 
the Sultan, and could he have prevailed upon 
the other powers, the Turkish Empire would, 
even before the Treaty of Adrianople, have been 
placed under a general European guarantee. He 
positively declared to the Courts of France and 
England, that he would sign no more treaties 
between Russia and Turkey, " which are nothing 
more than hollow truces, and leave in them the 
seeds of new dissensions and new wars."* J 

How came it then, that the intefftion of 
Prince Metternich was frustrated, and that Russia 

* These are his own words as they are reported by Count 
Pozzo di Borgo to Count Nesselrode. (Secret Despatch of 
December 14. 1828.) 



THE SECRET CORRESPONDENCE. 127 

triumphantly succeeded, both in war and in 
negotiation ? How came it, that the Treaty of 
Adrianople, with so many clauses which can 
only be construed as fatal to the independence 
of Turkey, and injurious to all the interests of 
Europe, was signed? The answer is, that the 
Treaty of Adrianople must be laid at the doors 
of France, and Prussia, and the English Oppo- 
sition. ( The Duke of Wellington and Lord 
AberdeerTfully shared in the apprehensions of 
Prince Metternich ; every despatch in the secret 
correspondence proves that they were not de- 
ceived, that their eyes were opened to the trea- 
chery, duplicity, and ambition of Russia, and 
that they would have been ready to join in a 
general Congress, to give effect to the project 
of the Austrian chancellor. The English minis- 
ters have no reason to regret the publication of 
those diplomatic curiosities. So far from offering 
the least evidence of connivance with Russia, these 
papers show how decidedly they were opposed to 
the Czar and his clever agents. One of the finest 
tributes any statesman ever received to his ho- 
nesty, sagacity, and patriotism is given to the 
Duke of Wellington by Pozzo di Borgo, in the 
most valuable of all those secret despatches. 
The artful diplomatist never supposed that the 
Duke would see this composition ; but it is at tlie 



128 FOREIGN POLICY. 

present time peculiarly deserving of attention. 
It proves incontestably what the Duke's real 
opinions were, how little his friendship for the 
Russian Emperor influenced his judgment as an 
English statesman, and how his sterling honesty 
and straightforward earnestness, backed by his 
great military fame, awed even the most dex- 
terous of Russian intriguers.* 

_ s ;.-' 

* " Our present situation will be appreciated with all its 
advantages. The sacrifices we have made in order to obtain 
them, although considerable, are by no means dispropor- 
tionate with the results ; and the magnitude of our resources 
displays itself still in a formidable manner to those even 
who are most disposed to question them. Those truths, 
M. le Comte, are evident to the French Government, which 
has never mistaken them ; and to just and impartial persons 
in this country. I will even add, from information I have 
acquired, that they are equally so to the Duke of Wellington. 
This great soldier has never drawn serious consequences 
from accidental successes, and from the unexpected resist- 
ance of the Turks. He has given to each event its degree 
of importance, and has carefully avoided exaggerating its 
effects. From the moment that he became aware of the 
number of imperial troops that had passed the Danube, he 
no longer, it is true, expected decisive results ; but he was 
perfectly sensible that the relative superiority would remain 
to our arms, and that discipline would triumph over enthu- 
siasm. It is this conviction which makes him foresee the 
probability and the almost certainty of a new campaign, 
and makes him apprehend the most disastrous consequences 
to the Ottoman Empire ; because he thinks, with reason, that 
experience will point to us the precautions we must take, 
and that the Emperor has the means of preventing any from 



THE SECRET CORRESPONDENCE. 129 

Far different, however, is the light in which 
the leaders of the Opposition appear to Count 
Lieven and Pozzo di Borgo. Th§ Russian diplo- 
matists chuckled, as they well might, when they 
saw the eminent champions of human freedom 
lend themselves blindly to the worst schemes of 
the tyrannical Emperor of Russia. It was not 
merely the existence of Turkey against which 
the Russian arms were directed. The object 
was even much greater. It was nothing less 
than to place the whole of Europe, and especially 
the freedom of the Western States, at the mercy 
of the Czar. This is not the assertion of a 
frantic visionary led astray by his vanity and 
enthusiasm. Pozzo di Borgo himself, the cun- 
ning and calculating diplomatist, positively ac- 
knowledges to Count Nesselrode in his- corres- 
pondence from Paris before the campaign of 
1829 had begun, that the war was for the purpose 



being neglected. I have acquired this information in a 
positive manner from the Prince de Polignac, who has just 
arrived from London, and who has communicated it to the 
King and his Ministers ; and I am the more disposed to 
place faith in it. because it is in harmony with that innate 
sagacity which I have always found the Duke to possess 
whenever he was called upon to exercise his judgment upon 
questions relating to a profession in which he has excelled 
in such a transcendent manner." — Secret Despatch from 
Count Pozzo di Borgo. Dated Paris, 28th Nov. 1828. 

K 



130 FOREIGN POLICY. 

" of confirming the influence of Eussia on the 
internal and external repose of the rest of 
Europe." How, might those enlightened English 
Liberals, who reprobated all the deeds of the 
Holy Alliance, have been expected to act in 
such a great European crisis ? The secret cor- 
respondence indicates with what eagerness the 
debates in the English Parliament were read in 
Russia, and what pleasure it gave to Count 
Nesselrode and the Emperor Nicholas to find 
that their policy did not want defenders, as 
Count Lieven assures them, amongst the most 
distinguished members of both Houses. Mr. 
Brougham's vehement declamation against the 
barbarism of Turkey ; Sir James Mackintosh's 
observations on " the danger of any guarantee 
in favour of the Ottoman Territory " ; and Lord 
Palmerston's warning against an " Austro- 
Turkish policy," were all immediately reported 
to St. Petersburg, and received with the great- 
est delight by the highest personages in the 
Russian Government. The Emperor of Russia, 
in return, favoured his ambassadors with imperial 
criticisms on the different specimens of English 
rhetoric which had been sent for his perusal. 
After studying the first of Lord Palmerston's 
speeches on the affairs of Portugal, in which he 
said that it was altogether out of the question 



NICHOLAS AND PALMERSTON. 131 

that England should go to war in defence of the 
Sultan, and that an Austrian Alliance for main- 
taining the independence of Turkey was not 
advisable, the Emperor Nicholas informed Count 
Lieven of the gratification which the study of 
that speech had given him, and declared that 
Lord Palmerston must be regarded as one of the 
greatest of English orators. The criticism was 
certainly just. But how far the sentiments it 
expressed, coinciding as these particular passages 
did exactly with the Emperor's own opinions, 
assisted his appreciation of the speech, and 
whether or not His Imperial Majesty's admira- 
tion of Lord Palmerston's eloquence has con- 
tinued up to the present time, there are not yet 
means of ascertaining. Should the archives of 
St. Petersburg, however, one day suffer the same 
fate as those of Warsaw, and their contents be 
disclosed to the English public, there can be no 
doubt that they will afford an edifying example 
of political toleration. In Austria, a Liberal is 
sure to be ranked as an enemy. But as long as 
they are subservient to his ambitious intents, 
enthusiasts of every description, politicians of 
the most opposite principles, Sir James Mackin- 
tosh and Count Eicquelmont, M. Chateaubriand 
and Mr. Cobden, have the impartial and cosmo- 

K 2 



132 FOREIGN POLICY. 

politan applause of the orthodox Defender of 
the Greek Faith. 

The future historian will some day have to 
record what an important part the Peace Society 
has played on the breaking out of the great war 
for the security of Europe. The Emperor of 
Russia trusted to the orations of the fanatical 
votaries of peace in 1853, as he formerly trusted 
to the speeches of the Opposition when he dic- 
tated the Treaty of Adrianople. Experience, 
the surest of guides in political affairs, | had 
taught him that in 1829 the Duke of Wellington 
and Lord Aberdeen, with their eyes open to the 
consequences of the unfortunate treaty, had been 
obliged to acquiesce in it: and that even Sir 
Eobert Gordon, the brother of the English 
Foreign Secretary, had advised the Sultan to 
accept those hard conditions of peace rather 
than continue a ruinous war.^J How could the 
Northern Autocrat expect that the result would 
have been different in the present day ? Were 
not some of the members of the Peace Society 
as influential politicians as the noble lords and 
honourable gentlemen who scouted the idea of 
defending Turkey twenty-six years ago ? Had 
they not spoken the sense of their countrymen 
in the great national struggle against monopoly 
so that even the great and powerful government 



INFLUENCE OF THE PEACE SOCIETY. 



133 



of Sir Eobert Peel had been unable to offer a 
successful resistance to the popular agitators ? 
Were not the blessings of peace as obvious to 
the multitude as those of cheap bread ? Could it 
be anticipated that Mr. Cobden, so omnipotent 
in his advocacy of one cause, would be so 
powerless in another? Were not the principal 
governments of the Continent as friendly to 
Russia in 1853 as in 1829 ? In 1829 there was 
the able Minister of Austria prepared to offer a 
determined opposition to the attack on Turkey, 
and the Austrian Empire was then powerful and 
independent; but in 1853, with Austria almost 
a dependency of Russia, and her politicians 
bitterly hostile to England, the greatest obstacle 
to the subjugation of the Sultan was removed. 
And what was there to fear from the rest of 
Europe ? What chance was there of any suc- 
cessful combination against Russia ? I Prussia 
was at this time, as in 1829, the ally and friend 
of the Czar. A Napoleon had just ascended the 
throne of France ; the just apprehensions of 
England had been excited; the English news- 
papers were almost unanimously reprobating in 
the most unmeasured terms the new ruler of 
France, and even Cabinet Ministers on the 
hustings had given free utterance to the same 
sentiments. What probability was there that 

K 3 



134 FOREIGN POLICY. 

an alliance between France and England, which 
for twenty years had prevented the hollow truce 
between Russia and Turkey from being osten- 
sibly disturbed, could again be cemented under 
a Napoleon ? The English ministers would 
doubtless protest against another invasion of 
Turkey; but did not Lord Aberdeen himself 
vigorously protest against the Treaty of Adri- 
anople without war having followed TJ 

This parallel between the state of Europe in 
1829, and that at the moment when Prince 
Menschikoff w r ent on his celebrated mission to 
Constantinople, which heralded the present war, 
may show that there was nothing so wild and 
imprudent in the recent attempt on the Ottoman 
Empire as has been represented. Appearances 
were decidedly in favour of Russia. The mo- 
ment was well chosen. None who fairly con- 
sider the circumstances of the two epochs of 
1829 and 1853, will venture to affirm that there 
was much probability of a great European war 
in defence of Turkey, after so many years of 
peace, and so much passive submission to Rus- 
sian aggression. This was not the act of a 
mad emperor ; there was much method in such 
madness. 

The Peace Society must be blamed for the 
present war, as the Whigs, and not Lord Aber- 



PARALLEL BETWEEN 1829 AND 1853. 135 

deen, must be blamed for the Treaty of Adrian- 
ople. Had the Opposition of that day been as 
conscious as the Ministers of the danger attend- 
ing Russian aggression, had the people been 
then as unanimous for war as they were for 
preserving peace, had the Liberals been as 
enthusiastic for the Turks as they were for the 
Greeks, the Government might have cordially 
joined with Austria, and have defied the Russian 
power. But to menace war, while resolved at 
all hazards to maintain peace, to provoke danger, 
and then to sneak out of it, would have been 
utterly unworthy of any English ministry, and 
especially of an administration in which the 
Duke of Wellington was prime minister. The 
degree of ignorance which has prevailed on the 
negotiations of 1829, and on all the circum- 
stances relating to the Eastern question, is really 
astonishing. Eminent politicians in the House 
of Commons, who have been regarded as au- 
thorities on foreign policy, have spoken of Lord 
Aberdeen as the maker of the very treaty against 
which he protested. The minister who has been 
accused of being in league with the Emperor of 
Russia, was, in fact, far beyond his age, when in 
1829 he saw the imperative necessity of resisting 
all encroachment upon Turkey.* 

* The author may be pardoned for stating that this chap- 
* k 4 



136 FOREIGN POLICY. 

ter was written some months before the Treaty of Adrian ople 
was directly referred to by Lord Lyndhurst in the House of 
Lords, and also before the despatch of Lord Aberdeen to 
Lord Heytesbury was published. It is scarcely necessary to 
add how much that remarkable despatch confirms the accu- 
racy and justice of the opinions here expressed. It is the 
ablest and most conclusive exposure of the systematic ag- 
gression of Russia ever drawn up by an English minister. 
It also plainly states the most unpalatable truths to the 
Russian Government which were ever addressed from one 
power to another without being followed by a declaration of 
war. Of the many volumes that have been written on the 
policy of Russia, this brief composition of Lord Aberdeen is 
by far the most valuable. But this statesman never does 
justice to himself when he speaks in Parliament. Even in 
his explanation of the 6th July, he did not put forth half 
the strength of his case. If all the circumstances of 1829, 
and the prevailing opinions of politicians were considered, 
the wisdom and foresight of the Minister must be acknow- 
ledged by every candid person. For the credit of English 
gentlemen, it is to be hoped that the public have heard the 
last repetition of those scandalous charges of " connivance" 
which have been so readily bandied about, without the least 
regard to common fairness, common candour, or common 
sense. 



137 



CHAR V. 

THE AFFAIRS OF GREECE. NEUTRALITY OF LORD ABER- 
DEEN IN THE CIVIL WAR OF PORTUGAL. STATE OF 

EUROPE IN 1830. RECOGNITION OF LOUIS PHILIPPE AS 

KING OF THE FRENCH. FALL OF THE GOVERNMENT. 

The establishment of the kingdom of Greece was 
the most arduous business of Lord Aberdeen 
while he continued Foreign Secretary in the 
ministry of the Duke of Wellington. /The Em- 
peror of Kussia, as our ministers soon found, 
never had any intention of making Greece an 
independent and powerful state. He opposed 
the extension of the frontier. He watched jea- 
lously any symptoms which it gave of national 
life. He would rather permit the Sultan to 
remain at Constantinople than see a real Byzan- 
tine empire take the place of the Ottoman rule. 
His policy it has ever been to prevent the growth 
of a sound political organisation in any part J 
of the Turkish dominions, which he regards,, 
whatever professions he may make, as naturally 
his by inheritance, pe considers himself as the 

/ *K 5 









138 FOREIGN POLICY. 

guardian of Turkey ; if not his own possession, 
he believes it to belong by right to his successors. 
It may now without shame be acknowledged, that 
there was some truth in the fear which the Op- 
position expressed that Lord Aberdeen did not 
heartily approve of the policy which he fairly 
carried out. As a traveller, and as a devoted 
student of Greek literature, if ever the associa- 
tions of ancient history could have prevailed over 
the calm wisdom of the statesman, they might 
have done so in the person of Lord Aberdeen. 
A quarter of a century earlier, he had assisted 
to form the association of the Athenian Tra- 
vellers. He had been chosen President of the 
Society of Antiquaries. He had travelled in 
many lands. But neither the traveller nor the 
antiquarian induced the Foreign Secretary to 
entertain any very sanguine hopes for the con- 
stitutional freedom of Greece. Perhaps a per- 
sonal observation of the social condition of the 
Morea had produced on him an effect directly 
contrary to what might have been expected. He 
was not deceived by names. He knew how unfit 
the descendants of Pericles and Themistocles 
were for the duties of a regular constitutional 
government after the fashion of the electors of 
Marylebone. 

The result of the British expedition to Por- 



CIVIL WAR IN PORTUGAL. 139 

tugal was, so far as it related to the maintenance 
of the Portuguese constitution, scarcely more il- 
lustrious. This is however no reproach to the 
minister by whom that expedition was sent out ; 
for England was bound to repel all aggression 
from the kingdom of Portugal. Our troops did 
not go to preserve the constitution, though it 
was the constitution which was really menaced. 
They had not been withdrawn when Don Miguel, 
without foreign aid, made his first attempt to 
overthrow it. As our obligations were to the 
kingdom and not to the constitution, our mi- 
nisters did not consider themselves bound to 
interfere, and soon the English people saw a 
usurper, and a despot seize, with the approba- 
tion of an influential portion of the people of 
Portugal, on the delegated inheritance of the 
infant Queen, Donna Maria. 

At that time the Liberal opinions which were 
soon to be triumphant in England were rapidly 
progressing, and many respectable politicians 
both in Parliament and in the country, were in- 
dignant at what they believed to be the apathy 
of Lord Aberdeen. They stigmatised him as a 
secret partisan of Don Miguel, and of despotism, 
because he preserved an unswerving and unsym- 
pathising neutrality. Then for the first time 
Lord Palmerston and Lord Aberdeen stood in 



140 FOREIGN POLICY. 

opposition to each other ; then for the first time 
the Liberal party began systematically to condemn 
the course pursued by the Secretary of State for 
Foreign Affairs. The minister had still a power- 
ful majority in both Houses of Parliament, and as 
the Opposition had been so long out of power, 
and the Tories had so long steadily supported 
Conservative governments, the Cabinet evidently 
never suspected for a moment that their majority 
would fail them. They were far too confident. 
In the days of Lord Castlereagh it was in vain 
that Mackintosh and Horner declaimed against 
the foreign policy of the Cabinet. But although 
the ministers did not see it, a great change had 
taken place in the mind of the nation. The 
settlement of the Roman Catholic question had 
severed for ever from the government a sincerely 
religious multitude, who had long supported 
them solely for the sake of excluding from Par- 
liament those who acknowledged the spiritual 
supremacy of the Pope. For many years the 
ministers who had repealed the Eoman Catholic 
disabilities had resisted both that measure and a 
Reform Bill. The two propositions had gene- 
rally been classed together as dangerous inno- 
vations. Sir Robert Peel and the Duke of Wel- 
lington had confessed that they were wrong in 
resisting the one; why should they not also be 



NEUTRALITY OF LORD ABERDEEN. 141 

wrong in opposing the other ? The reputation 
of the Government for political sagacity had de- 
parted ; and the great body of the people became 
.Reformers, both at home and abroad. 

Much, indeed, may be said for the Government. 
It was easier to declaim against Lord Aberdeen 
than to point out how he could have acted in any 
other manner. Had Canning been in office, it is 
more than doubtful whether he would have done 
otherwise than the then Secretary for Foreign 
Affairs. The neutrality of Lord Aberdeen in the 
affairs of Portugal can never be considered, what- 
ever the Opposition might assert, an abandonment 
of the system of foreign policy which Canning in- 
augurated, and which the Duke of Wellington, on 
taking office as prime minister, solemnly pledged 
himself and his government to pursue. When the 
British troops left England for Lisbon, Canning 
expressly said they went simply to defend the Por- 
tuguese territories from invasion. He most cau- 
tiously guarded himself from guaranteeing the 
new constitution. He foresaw that it would not 
be permanent, and that it might produce civil 
commotions. In these domestic contentions he 
had determined that England should not in any 
manner interfere. Our neutrality was then a 
mere question of policy, as in the case of the 
attack on the Spanish constitution by the French 



142 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Legitimists ; and it cannot be said that our 
interests were more directly interfered with in 
the one than in the other. England might re- 
gret the violation of the Portuguese constitution, 
as unquestionably she regretted the establish- 
ment of despotism in Spain. But she could not 
hinder what she might sincerely lament. 

The French army never would have been suc- 
cessful in Spain had not the majority of the 
Spaniards sympathised with the invaders. Don 
Miguel never would have set the constitutionalists 
at defiance had the Portuguese sincerely desired 
the blessing which Don Pedro had bequeathed to 
them. In both kingdoms, the victory of despo- 
tism can only be explained by admitting what 
Canning and Lord Aberdeen asserted, that the 
people really at the moment preferred arbitrary 
monarchs. Surprising as this may seem to us, 
when we think of our love of constitutional 
freedom, it is not so singular when the history 
of these particular countries is remembered. All 
their traditions were monarchical ; they had both 
cruelly suffered by men who called themselves 
constitutionalists; the most glorious period of 
Spanish history began after the Cortes of Castille 
had been dissolved by military violence ; the new 
constitution of Portugal was associated in the 
minds of the multitude with the loss of the 



STATE OF EUROPE IN 1830. 143 

Brazils, and it was the gift of one whom they 
could not regard as their national sovereign. 

The reaction against republican agitation had 
reached its climax in the spring of 1830. Des- 
potism was once more the fashion ; society 
seemed in the same state as in the days before 
the Bastille fell; through years of blood and 
confusion vainly the patriot appeared to have 
struggled, vainly the hero to have fought, vainly 
the martyr to have died. The ardent but un- 
wise assertors of freedom had been put down in 
Naples, Spain, and Portugal ; the King of France 
was closely allied with the Czar of Eussia ; the 
disciples of Ignatius Loyola once more crowded 
round the thrones of kings ; and the generous 
aspirations of mankind were in danger of being 
once more stifled by the monk's black cowl. East 
and west, north and south, the soldier was 
abroad, not to protect governments from foreign 
enemies, but from the indignant hatred of their 
own subjects. With the spirit of freedom the 
spirit of loyalty also appeared to have fled from 
the earth ; Europe was prostrate in a dull and 
unnatural trance ; the iron age of absolutism 
seemed to have come ; an age without hope, 
without love, without faith, without reverence, 
but also without rebellion. Millions of armed 
men, thousands of dungeons, racks and gibbets, the 



144 FOREIGN POLICY. 

systematic and harmonious efforts of many pro- 
found statesmen had been engaged in bringing 
about this delightful era : and with scarcely a 
musket being fired, or a single warning given, in 
a moment it passed away. 

The ordinances of the 25th July, by which 
the French Charter was suspended and virtually 
abrogated, boldly set the lovers of constitu- 
tional freedom at defiance. They calmly took 
up the challenge which the feeble hands of 
Charles the Tenth and his Jesuits had cast at 
their feet. Paris put forth its strength. The 
contest was not for a moment doubtful. The 
Bourbons were driven from the throne, and the 
popular convulsion in which the restored mon- 
archy disappeared, spread throughout Europe. 
At the first rumour of the expulsion of Charles 
the Tenth from France, the Czar of Kussia put 
his legions in motion to invade France once 
more, and place the ancient dynasty on the 
throne by force of arms. Nicholas never hesi- 
tated ; he took it for granted that what he and 
his allies had once done, they could always do. 
He considered himself the Captain General of the 
Holy Alliance, and thought it his duty to check 
all popular outbreaks, however much they might 
have been provoked, and however much justice 
might be on their side. But news of tremendous 



RECOGNITION OF LOUIS PHILIPPE. 145 

import reached his ears. The Duke of Orleans 
had been placed on the French throne, which was 
thus identified with popular freedom, and the new 
sovereign had been recognised by the English 
Government, with the Duke of Wellington, the 
friend of sovereigns, at its head. This intelli- 
gence immediately brought the hosts of the Czar 
to a stand. At the sight of England crossing 
the path of despotism, all the formidable strength 
of the Holy Alliance was powerless, and the 
Cossacks slowly retraced their steps. 

This recognition of the throne of the barri- 
cades by Lord Aberdeen and the Duke of 
Wellington, had a most decisive effect. The 
moral weight of England was sufficient to 
paralyse the right arm of absolutism ; the ela- 
borate machinery of oppression which had been 
brought to such exquisite perfection was broken 
to pieces, and a mighty impulse was given to 
the cause of nationality and freedom throughout 
the world. The Czar was surprised that the 
Duke of Wellington and Lord Aberdeen should 
have acted so readily in opposition to what he 
supposed to be their settled principles. Had he 
really been acquainted with the characters of the 
two statesmen, or even known the condition of 
the nation which they governed, he would have 
seen that it was impossible for them to have 

L 



146 FOREIGN POLICY. 

done otherwise. But recent events have shown 
that notwithstanding the vaunted omniscience 
of Russian diplomacy, Nicholas is extremely 
ignorant of the social condition and the feelings 
of England, and even of the real characters and 
principles of politicians whom he ought most 
especially to know. As it is possible to give too 
fine an edge to a sword, it is also possible for a 
diplomatist to be too skilful. A Russian emis- 
sary frequently believes he is deceiving others, 
while he is only deceiving himself and his 
master. 

Though the English ministers had reason to 
distrust the Bourbons, though the close alliance 
between Charles the Tenth and Nicholas was the 
cause of some anxiety to them, though they had 
even begun to suspect that they had been deceived 
when they gave credence to the assurance of the 
French Ambassador that the expedition to 
Algiers was not undertaken for the purpose of 
conquest, these were not the motives which 
induced the Prime Minister to acknowledge the 
government of Louis Philippe, The Duke of 
Wellington and Lord Aberdeen did not fear the 
combined hostility of France and Russia. It was 
from no hysterical apprehension of this nature, 
whatever M. Louis Blanc and Sir Archibald 
Alison may believe, that our Government then 



RECOGNITION OF LOUIS PHILIPPE. 147 

acted. The English historian who has written 
more than thirty volumes on the affairs of 
Europe since the French Revolution, and still 
can credit such a fable, has yet to learn the 
alphabet of state policy. The ministers acted 
on those plain principles which were first an- 
nounced by the Duke of "Wellington at the Con- 
gress of Verona, and from which they had really 
never deviated nor thought of deviating. 

Had the government of Charles the Tenth been 
as friendly to England as it was secretly hos- 
tile, our ministers would still not have shrunk 
from acknowledging Louis Philippe as King of 
the French. No English Cabinet could have 
refused to recognise the justifiable departure 
from the direct line of succession, and the es- 
tablishment of a constitutional monarchy. The 
Duke of Orleans had long been regarded as the 
future sovereign of France. The example of 
England had been frequently quoted as showing 
the advantages of such a government, even 
before Charles the Tenth had ascended the 
throne : and in the event of the Bourbons being 
dethroned, the English ministers had never con- 
templated the possibility of this country going to 
war to restore to them again that power which 
they evidently knew not how to use. They had 
certainly been most ungrateful to England. 

L 2 



148 FOREIGN POLICY. 

They had been just as forgetful of the benefits 
we had conferred upon them, as our other allies. 
By the confession of Chateaubriand, and other 
French legitimatists, we have since their fall learnt 
what we had to expect. War with England 
was certainly contemplated. The greatest re- 
proach that has been made to the Napoleonists 
and the Republicans was that should they ever 
be in the ascendant, the treaties of Vienna would 
be considered as so much waste paper, and war 
begun to extend the French frontier to the 
Rhine, We have now witnessed both a Repub- 
lican and a Napoleonist administration. By 
both we have seen the national faith preserved, 
and the treaties of Vienna still accepted. What 
the most violent of those who were called 
revolutionists have not done, the Bourbons 
meditated doing. We know that they were 
inclined to put the axe to the roots of their own 
tree of life. We know that they had determined 
to set the stipulations of the Congress of Vienna 
at defiance, and, with an infatuation almost in- 
credible, revive the ambitious projects which 
both Louis the Fourteenth and Napoleon were 
unable to execute. Their punishment was just. 
They despised the alliance of England, and 
servilely courted Russia ; they have now not a 
friend or well-wisher in this country, and are 



PRECOGNITION OF LOUIS PHILIPPE. 149 

finally expelled from the rich inheritance of 
their ancestors. Their intimacy with Russia 
has only rendered their restoration to France 
hopeless ; there is not a Frenchman with any 
real patriotic feeling in his breast who would 
not spend the last drop of his blood to save his 
country from the degradation of accepting a 
sovereign from the hands of the Czar. 

It must be regarded as a fortunate circumstance 
that Lord Aberdeen should have been Foreign 
Minister when the new king was proclaimed at 
Paris, and should thus have given such a check to 
the imperious policy of Russia. It rendered the 
breach between England and the Holy Alliance 
complete. It separated this country for ever 
from the absolute monarchies. That this recog- 
nition of the Duke of Orleans as King should 
have frustrated the plans of Nicholas, proves how 
straightforward was the policy of the English 
minister, and that so far from being the accom- 
plice of the Czar at this time, throughout the 
two years and a half Lord Aberdeen held office, 
he had been invariably opposed to Russia. In 
May, 1828, he had deliberately acceded to an 
administration pledged to maintain the Turkish 
Empire as necessary to the balance of power in 
Europe ; and his last great public act as Foreign 
Minister was to establish friendly relations with 

L 3 



150 FOREIGN POLICY. 

the new French king whom the Czar would have 
been glad to hurl from his throne. 

The news of the abdication of Charles the 
Tenth and the election of Louis Philippe reached 
England a few days after Parliament had been 
dissolved on the accession of William the Fourth. 
The popular party were delighted. On every 
hustings this change in France was the theme 
of declamation in favour of freedom; and as 
England had a new sovereign and a new Par- 
liament, the people exerted themselves to place 
in power a new Ministry. The Tories were no 
longer enthusiastic about the Duke of Wellington, 
since he had conceded Catholic Emancipation. 
The Ministry fell. But it must be remembered 
that as the appointment of Lord Aberdeen as 
Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs was not 
occasioned by any question of foreign policy, so 
the fall of the Wellington administration and 
the installation of Lord Palmerston in the Foreign 
Office was also exclusively on a domestic subject. 
It was the desire for a reform in our internal 
affairs which dismissed the Duke of Wellington 
and the Earl of Aberdeen, and carried the Whigs 
and Lord Palmerston to Downing Street on the 
stream of popular enthusiasm. 



151 



CHAP. VI. 

LORD PALMERSTON AS FOREIGN SECRETARY. — HIS PREVIOUS 

CAREER. FRIENDSHIP WITH FRANCE. HOLLAND AND 

BELGIUM. RUSSO-DUTCH LOAN. EFFECTS OF FALSE 

ECONOMY. — TREATY OF UNKIAR SKELESSI. NEW KING- 
DOM OF GREECE. — SPAIN AND PORTUGAL. THE QUAD- 
RUPLE ALLIANCE. — PEACE AT ANY PRICE. 

The minister who now assumed the respon- 
sibility of Foreign Affairs, and who has been for 
twenty-five years prominently before the world, 
had served such an apprenticeship to the business 
of administration as perhaps no other statesman 
had ever passed through. There are instances 
of some of the relatives of the first generation of 
Elizabethan ministers having been initiated in 
childhood into the mysteries of diplomacy, and 
designed from their cradles to fill the highest 
offices of state. But they owed their position 
to family influence. They were connections 
of Burleigh and his colleagues, and the rank 
which many of them attained was not always 
according to their merits. Though an Irish peer, 
Lord Palmerston had not many powerful friends 

L 4 



152 FOREIGN POLICY. 

to push him over the heads of able rivals. He 
owed his appointment to the important post 
of Secretary at War entirely to the reputation 
which he so early acquired. For nearly twenty 
years he performed the duties of that department 
with such efficiency and success as may perhaps 
have been equalled, but have certainly never been 
surpassed. He was not the slave of routine, but 
a zealous administrative reformer. The intricate 
details of military finance, and the regulations 
of the army were subjected to his careful super- 
vision; and immense improvements were effected, 
for which he neither received nor expected 
popular applause. Few people but those inti- 
mately conversant with this department, ever 
knew how much Lord Palmerston had done for 
the efficiency of the service, or even had the least 
idea of his great administrative abilities. When 
he entered the War Office he found everything 
in the greatest confusion ; but after his long 
tenure of this important place he left it a model 
of order and industry. 

At this time Lord Palmerston troubled him- 
self very little about the personal differences 
between Castlereagh and Canning. He had not 
yet become the ardent friend of Canning, and 
he confined his activity to his office. He was the 
Secretary at War, and Secretary at War he con- 



LORD PALMERSTON. 153 

tinued to be until it appeared that Lord Palmer- 
ston and this department could never be disunited. 
Through all the season of youth and early man- 
hood, through all the changes of administrations, 
through all the vicissitudes of empires, in war 
and in peace, Lord Palmerston remained Secre- 
tary at War. During that time the most me- 
morable events in European history occurred; 
the most important domestic and foreign ques- 
tions were discussed; while year after year he sat 
silent throughout the greatest debates, year after 
year he contented himself with moving the army 
estimates: in discussions on foreign policy, when 
Lord Castlereagh was Secretary for Foreign 
Affairs, he scarcely ever opened his lips. Such 
taciturnity, when Lord Palmerston's powers as 
an orator and his actions in future years are 
considered, is truly wonderful and almost incre- 
dible. 

When Canning became Foreign Minister, Lord 
Palmerston's consciousness of his great abilities 
slowly awakened. He gradually overcame what 
must be called, however surprising it may 
seem, his habitual modesty. He spoke well on 
the affairs of Spain. He spoke well and more 
frequently on other topics. He began to an- 
nounce some decided opinions on the political 
and commercial questions of the day. For Mr. 



154 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Canning he now felt warm admiration, and ad- 
hered to him with generous fidelity when this 
injured statesman formed his ministry, and so 
many influential Tory politicians sent in their 
resignations and positively refused to serve under 
a Prime Minister favourable to the claims of the 
Roman Catholics. Lord Palmerston had now a 
seat in the Cabinet, though he still held his old 
office. On the death of the Prime Minister he 
remained Secretary at War under Lord Goderich, 
and even seemed to take a new lease of the same 
place under the Duke of Wellington. But at 
the moment when it might have been confidently 
reckoned that Lord Palmerston would be Secre- 
tary at War for nineteen or twenty years longer, 
he suddenly resigned with the other friends of 
Mr. Canning. He gave an extremely graceful 
explanation of the reasons why he followed his 
friend Mr. Huskisson out of office, declaring 
that he fully adopted that gentleman's com- 
mercial principles, and, as he distrusted his own 
powers, had taken him for his guide. The un- 
pretending demeanour of Lord Palmerston after 
so many years of official services, at this crisis of 
his political life, offers a remarkable contrast to 
the forwardness of other politicians who, after a 
few months of parliamentary experience, and 
sometimes as soon as they are elected, represent 



LORD PALMERSTON IN OPPOSITION. 155 

themselves as capable of leading the House of 
Commons. " It may be thought presump- 
tuous," he said, " to imagine it of importance to 
any one in the House or elsewhere, to know why 
so humble an individual as I am accepted or 
retired from office; but it will be satisfactory, 
at least to me, to set myself right with the 
public." Such was Lord Palmerston on leaving 
the Ministry. His successes had all been legiti- 
mate. With a little more pretension he might 
long before have vindicated his claims to one of 
the highest posts in the Government. 

He was now for the first time in opposition. 
Deprived of his office, the House of Commons 
became the sphere of his activity. His ambition 
was fully roused, and the Duke of Wellington 
and the Cabinet soon had reason to regret the 
day on which they permitted their modest and 
retiring Secretary at War to leave the adminis- 
tration. Without an effort, and without giving 
the Government any notice of what they had to 
expect from him, he stood forth as one of the 
ablest debaters and most effective speakers of 
the House of Commons. But there was nothing 
captious or paltry in his opposition. When the 
Ministers brought in the great bill for enfran- 
chising the Roman Catholics, Lord Palmerston 
nobly defended Sir Robert Peel from the attacks 



156 FOREIGN POLICY. 

of those who were nominally supporters of the 
Government, and said that so far from deserving 
the taunts which had been levelled at him for 
his inconsistency, his conduct on manfully at- 
tempting the settlement of the question was "the 
greatest and most glorious portion of his career." 
Like Lord Aberdeen, Lord Palmerston had 
always been the advocate of Roman . Catholic 
Emancipation ; his speech on the second reading 
of the bill was one of the ablest ever delivered on 
the question, and powerfully contributed to the 
final triumph of the measure. 

So influential was his support to this pro- 
position of the Government. His criticisms on 
their foreign policy were not less effective, 
and it tasked all Sir Robert Peel's abilities to 
meet the antagonist who now took the leading 
part in the discussions on the affairs of 
Europe. Since the death of Canning, there had 
been no speeches on foreign policy worthy of 
being compared with Lord Palmerston's two 
great orations on the troubles of Portugal. 
Their oratorical merits are very high ; in some 
respects they are even superior to the best of 
Canning's speeches on almost the same subject; 
for they are less artificial, and display a vein of 
genuine manly eloquence, without any mere 
rhetorical refinement. Their effect was great : 



POLICY OF A FOREIGN MINISTER. 157 

they reverberated throughout England, sank 
deep into the hearts of thousands, and announced 
Lord Palmerston as the coming Secretary of 
State for Foreign Affairs. 

To enter into any detail of the vast European 
transactions in which Lord Palmerston has been 
engaged, would occupy many volumes, and 
might even then be far from satisfactory. Little/ 
of the principles and policy of a Foreign Minister, 
is to be learnt from rows of Annual Eegisters ; 
still less can any extracts from speeches delivered 
in the House of Commons give a just idea of 
his career. The Secretary of State for Foreign 
Affairs, when he speaks in Parliament, in reality 
addresses the whole civilized world. He is 
obliged to suppress much that in other circum- 
stances he would gladly utter, and to say much 
that, if not altogether false, is at least only 
parallel with the truth. Lie is compelled to 
speak with the reservation, and frequently with 
the insincerity, of a diplomatist. Yet there must 
be a clue to a course of policy ; and with a little 
judgment and patience it may be unfolded. A 
rapid glance at the most important affairs in 
their order, as they arise, will indicate much that 
is not to be seen written in State Papers, or printed 
in Hansard's Debates. The principle of the philo- 
sophy of Lord Bacon applied to a long series 
of foreign affairs, is a sure guide, and must 



158 FOREIGN POLICY. 

conduct an impartial observer to the truth. 
There is seldom only one course open to a mi- 
nister. He is generally obliged to make a choice 
between evils. He never can answer all the ob- 
jections of his opponents. It is easy for an in- 
genious mind to find powerful arguments against 
any policy. Gerard Hamilton believed that so 
much could be said both for and against any 
measure, that it was impossible to decide which 
course was the best ; and he contentedly lived 
without any earnest convictions. But this was 
the reasoning of a weak, a timid, an abject 
spirit. To do any good, or be worth anything, 
we must heartily believe that in politics, as in 
every other business in this world, there is a 
right and a wrong, a truth and a falsehood. 
Making allowance for difficulties, not expecting 
impossibilities, and avoiding all mere abstrac- 
tions, we may thus fairly estimate the characters 
of our statesmen. The past cannot be recalled ; 
and instead of troubling ourselves about how 
many courses were open to a Minister, we may 
endeavour to understand that which he has taken. 
Not what he might have done, but what he has 
done may be profitably considered. He is thus 
tried by his own standard ; he is the mirror of 
his own glory or shame. 

Amid the reform excitement, Lord Palmerston 



LORD PALMERSTON FOREIGN MINISTER. 159 

commenced his career as Foreign Minister. The 
whole of Europe was in commotion; from France, 
as a centre, the spirit of Eeform had pervaded 
the Continent. Then was seen how futile had 
been the efforts of the Holy Alliance, how little 
good the treaties of Vienna had accomplished, 
how inflammable was the popular spirit which 
was supposed to have been extinguished. Bel- 
gium threw off the yoke of Holland ; the Poles 
rose against Kussia ; over the Alps and through 
Italy the revolutionary contagion rapidly spread ; 
the thrones of the Peninsula tottered ; the re- 
motest corners of Europe felt the effects of the 
wild explosion. 

Here was a world in which even the abilities 
of the greatest of human intellects might find it 
an arduous task to govern. The first act of the 
English Minister was to draw the bonds of 
friendship closer between England and France. 
The two Governments began to be considered as 
allies. For the first time a French alliance was 
spoken of with respect. It was indeed a critical 
moment. The peace which had endured for 
fifteen years seemed about to end ; war not only 
appeared probable, but was believed to be inevi- 
table. The good understanding established 
between the two Western Powers, at that 
crisis unquestionably saved Europe from this 



160 FOREIGN POLICY. 

calamity ; and to Lord Palmerston is clue the 
credit of having, notwithstanding the sneers of 
politicians who foretold a speedy quarrel, per- 
severed to perfect that union. The necessity of 
such a concert was indeed evident ; approaches 
to it were made by Lord Aberdeen when he re- 
cognised the government of Louis Philippe : it 
was no new policy, no departure from a former 
system. Circumstances, more influential than 
statesmen, were gradually bringing about this 
friendly feeling : England and France had com- 
mon objects and common enemies ; whoever 
might have been the minister, such a friendship 
between the two great neighbouring nations 
must have been formed. 

Had other councils prevailed, Belgium must 
have immediately become again a battle field 
between them, and every European government 
might have joined in this shock of arms. The 
king of the French saw the importance of con- 
ciliating England ; the time had not yet come 
when he durst venture to display any dynastic 
views on other countries and set the English 
Ministry at defiance. 

The affairs of Belgium were soon the most 
pressing business of the Foreign Secretary. 
In at length deciding that it was impossible to 
unite Holland and Belgium again under the 



HOLLAND AND BELGIUM. 161 

sceptre of the King of the Netherlands, Lord Pal- 
merston did not, any more than in his friendship 
with France, carry out a new line of policy. 
Before the late Government resigned, the King 
of Holland had appealed to the Treaty of Vienna, 
and Lord Aberdeen had distinctly refused to assist 
him with the forces of England in reducing the 
Belgians to submission. When the Conference of 
the Great Powers met in London, a complete se- 
paration was not indeed decided upon ; but it was 
seen that in thus departing from the treaties of 
Vienna, statesmen only conformed to the cir- 
cumstances of the case ; the folly of this arrange- 
ment, the masterpiece of Lord Castlereagh's 
genius, had been fully exemplified : a permanent 
union between Holland and Belgium was clearly 
an impossibility. The difficulties of a final 
settlement, owing to the King of Holland on one 
side and to the Belgian people on the other, were 
very great, and for a long time seemed insuper- 
able. That all obstacles were at length over- 
come, that a prince connected with England was 
placed on the throne of Belgium, that religious 
differences were reconciled, and a happy and 
prosperous constitutional monarchy founded, 
all this was the work of Lord Palmerston; 
and when he is reproached with the failure of 

M 



162 FOREIGN POLICY. 

other constitutional experiments, it is but justice 
to remember those which have succeeded. 

No insurrection ever promised less to end in 
the permanent establishment of a moderate con- 
stitutional monarchy than that of Belgium ; none 
has ever had happier results. The Belgians 
were not indeed very grateful to their bene- 
factor ; because, while asserting their indepen- 
dence, he would not permit them to deprive the 
Dutch sovereign of territories which peculiarly 
and incontestably belonged to Holland. There 
was nothing in the wisdom and foresight of the 
men who took the leading part in the revolt, to 
hinder it from terminating like many other in- 
surrections of that year. The agitators were 
wild and reckless. At one time they even 
elected the Duke of Nemours as king, although 
they must have known- that such a choice would 
involve them in a European war, withdraw from 
them the moral support of England, and menace 
the new kingdom with destruction. The steady 
hand of Lord Palmerston steered their frail 
vessel through all the sunken rocks and dan- 
gerous shallows which threatened to wreck it 
before it reached the open sea, and it now sails 
bravely along in the wake of England, defying 
the fury of the elements. 

When the Treaty of Vienna, by which Bel- 



THE RUSSO-DUTCH LOAN. 163 

gium and Holland were connected, was signed, 
England undertook to support the credit of the 
new state. Fortresses were to be built, debts 
were to be paid, ready money was to be found ; 
and hence originated the payment of that cele- 
brated Russo-Dutch Loan which has so much 
displeased our liberal and economical politicians. 
The wisdom of the agreement may be questioned. 
It was supposed that the creation of the King- 
dom of the Netherlands was essentially an 
English interest ; and that when we thus con- 
sented to pay at stated and recurring periods 
part of the debt to Russia, we gave to the Czar 
a powerful motive for not taking any measures 
likely to disturb the quiet of this political crea- 
tion of Lord Castlereagh and the Congress of 
Vienna. But in spite of all the fine phrases of 
diplomatists, the Kingdom of the Netherlands, if 
it could have endured, must, by bridling France 
and Prussia, have been as much a Russian as an 
English interest. It is certain that when the 
Czar had any good reason for becoming the 
enemy of this kingdom, the mere payment of a 
sum of money would scarcely convert him into a 
sincere friend. And this payment of gold to 
induce one Power not to act contrary to the 
interests of another, can scarcely be distinguished 
from a tribute. A great nation such as England 

M 2 



164 FOREIGN POLICY. 

should surely be able to protect her own in- 
terests without subsidising other sovereigns that 
they may respect them ; and to pay for friend- 
ship is in reality to give a premium to hostility. 
The moment too that it might become of vital 
importance to Russia to oppose the welfare of 
the Netherlands, it required no prophetic facul- 
ties to see that the few millions which our 
ministers added to her treasury would not pre- 
vent her from being the antagonist of this small 
state. 

But whether the policy of the transaction was 
good or bad, when the treaty had been con- 
cluded, there can be no doubt that the honour 
of England was pledged to the punctual pay- 
ment of her share in the loan. After the sepa- 
ration from Holland had been decided upon at 
the Conference in London, Lord Palmerston still 
continued to pay the money as it became due, 
though it had been expressly stipulated in the 
treaty that all payments should cease in the 
event of the provinces of Belgium being dis- 
united from Holland, and though the Dutch had 
refused to pay their share of the debt, when the 
Great Powers consented to sever Belgium from 
the dominions of the King of the Netherlands. 
The public out of doors were angry. The Op- 
position eagerly seized the opportunity for an 



THE RUSSO-DUTCH LOAN. 165 

attack on the Eeform Ministry. Powerful as 
the Whigs were at that time, many of their own 
supporters voted against them, and they de- 
feated the resolution which Mr. Herries brought 
forward condemning the course the Foreign 
Secretary had taken, by a very small majority. 
Lord Palmerston defended himself ably. He 
contended that nations should be more li- 
beral in their interpretation of pecuniary en- 
gagements than individuals ; that such agree- 
ments as that for the liquidation of the Russo- 
Dutch loan should be construed according to the 
spirit and not merely according to the form. It 
might appear strange, he said, that we should at 
one time pay Russia for supporting the union of 
Belgium and Holland, and at another time pay 
her for supporting their separation. But after 
all, the principle was the same. It was at one 
time considered to be the interest of England 
that the Low Countries should be united; it was 
now the interest of England that they should be 
separated ; Russia now as before had given the 
assurance that she would adapt her policy re- 
garding Belgium to our interests ; hence the 
spirit of the former treaty remained, although it 
had apparently become a dead letter. The money 
was therefore paid, and continues now to be 
paid, even when England is at war with Russia. 

M 3 



166 FOREIGN POLICY. 

While this may demonstrate the absurdity of the 
original agreement, it shows how anxious our 
ministers were to preserve the faith of England, 
and how scrupulously they shunned any pre- 
tences for evading pecuniary engagements. 

At the sight of such an example of national 
integrity, contrasted with the spectacle of public 
swindling which other countries have exhibited, 
Englishmen may well be proud of their nation 
and their statesmen. Such conduct was wise 
and upright. The saving of one or two millions, 
had we repudiated the debt, would have been 
wretched economy, since the national credit might 
have been injured. By taking advantage of the 
change of circumstances to declare ourselves 
free from the obligation, it is easy to calculate 
what we should have saved, but very difficult 
to estimate what we might have lost. National 
credit is national wealth ; and the honour of the 
state the inheritance of the citizen.* 

* As these pages are passing through the press, the 
Russo -Dutch Loan has again been the subject of discussion 
in Parliament. Lord Dudley Stuart moved certain resolu- 
tions, to the effect that as Russia had flagrantly violated the 
Treaty of Vienna by not keeping the Sulina mouth of the 
Danube free from obstructions, the payment of the loan 
should be suspended. Sir William Molesworth, in a very 
luminous speech, opposed the resolutions ; and the House, 
by a great majority, ratified the opinion of the Government, 



THE RUSSO-DUTCH LOAN. 167 

Count Ficquelmont himself does not venture 
to charge us with dexterously slipping out of 
our pecuniary obligations. This strict adher- 

that even when we are at war, and though unquestionably 
Russia had been guilty of repeated violations of those 
treaties to which her faith was pledged, a regard to public 
credit required that the payment should be continued. This 
decision was right. Sir William Molesworth's arguments, in 
reply to Lord Dudley Stuart, were unanswerable. But they 
did not in the slightest degree prove that the original ar- 
rangement was either politic or wise. The four colonies 
which England received were not worth six millions, nor 
one million ; and to represent our agreement to pay part of 
the Russo-Dutch Loan, as the payment of a sum of money 
for the purchase of these colonies, is really to give a most 
mistaken idea of the whole transaction. If the exertions of 
Russia for the independence of Holland justified the pay- 
ment by other states, of the loan which she had con- 
tracted in that country, all the kingdoms and empires 
of the Continent would have been much more justified 
in taking upon themselves some portion of the immense 
national debt which England had contracted in the course 
of the struggle for European independence. What were 
the "heavy expenses which Russia had incurred in de- 
livering the Netherlands from the power of the enemy," 
to the enormous liabilities which England herself had in- 
curred by fighting the battles of the whole civilised world ? 
If England only obeyed the instinct of self-preservation in 
thus stubbornly carrying on the contest, did Russia do more 
when, at the eleventh hour, after Napoleon had been be- 
trayed by fortune and by his allies, she united for the 
deliverance of Holland ? In fact, all this is mere cant. The 
idea of giving to Russia " a strong pecuniary motive to 
identify her policy with ours respecting Belgium," is ridi- 

m 4 



168 FOREIGN POLICY. 

ence to the treaties of Vienna which our minister 
then displayed, was worthy of the respect of 
the civilised world. But it did not find imita- 
tors. Russia especially, who had gained so 
much from these arrangements, and who has 
always been so ready to insist on the conformity 
of other Powers, was even then setting them at 
defiance. No person can read the particular 
Treaty by which Eussia acquired nearly all 
that had not yet been partitioned of Poland, 
and deny that a free constitution and the rights 
of the Czar were expressly connected together. 
The same treaty which gave Poland to Russia 
gave a constitution to the Poles. Until 1830 a 
constitution of some sort they possessed. It 
could not indeed be called free ; it had been 
violated at the mere pleasure of the Czar ; his 
actions had clearly showed that he applied the 

culous. The truth is, that the Minister who first agreed to 
pay the Russo-Dutch Loan was foolish, and the people of 
England for many generations, until the year 1915, must 
pay for his folly. Yet Lord Dudley Stuart was mistaken in 
wishing to see the payment of this loan suspended under 
present circumstances. The motives of this generous noble- 
man are, however, always pure ; his sentiments are generally 
exalted ; his enthusiasm in the cause of the oppressed is 
worthy of all respect. It is good that there should be such 
men in the House of Commons, firmly attached to great 
principles, and occasionally obliged to dissent from Ministers, 
but scornfully refusing to play the discreditable game of 
nominal leaders of Opposition. 



POLAND. 169 

principles of the Holy Alliance to Poland, and 
considered the constitution as depending upon 
his convenience. The cruelties which the Grand 
Duke Constantine inflicted on the people who in 
an evil hour had become Russian subjects, would 
be thought incredible were they not estab- 
lished by incontestable evidence. When the 
news of the successful revolution in France ar- 
rived at Warsaw, the aspirations for freedom 
which the Poles must ever indulge until they are 
extirpated, induced them also, with the rest 
of the down-trodden millions of Europe, to 
attempt the recovery of their independence. 
Heated by resistance, sanguine from their first 
successes, and wildly expecting assistance from 
France and England, they at length formally 
renounced all allegiance to the Czar. But the 
cruel yoke of the Cossack was not to be 
shaken off. In spite of the tremendous efforts 
which the intrepid patriots, with the hereditary 
valour of their race, made for their freedom, they 
were at last defeated : Warsaw surrendered, and 
vengeance was taken. The constitution was 
subverted. The Poles were now formally treated 
as a conquered people. 

They had unquestionably acted imprudently 
in pronouncing the deposition of their tyrant 
before they were certain of achieving their inde- 
pendence. They committed the same mistake 



170 FOREIGN POLICY. 

as the Hungarians did some years later. Even 
Lord Palmerston acknowledged that they were 
the aggressors ; but he anxiously endeavoured 
to befriend them as much as was in his power. 
Before the Russian troops entered Warsaw, and 
while the result of the struggle was undecided 
though it was but too probable, he had informed 
Nicholas that he thought the Treaty of Yienna 
still in force, and that the right of Poland to her 
constitution had not been forfeited by the rebel- 
lion. It was besides asserted in the proclama- 
tions to the Russians, while the conflict was 
raging, that this insurrection was only partial. 
It was therefore grossly unjust, even had the 
Treaty of Yienna not existed, to punish a whole 
nation for the fault of individuals. Although 
England had acquired little else by the treaties 
of Yienna, still as one of the contracting parties to 
them she had the privilege, as Lord Palmerston 
maintained, to remonstrate against their violation. 
This she did, when our minister declared his 
opinion, that by express treaty, Poland had a 
right, which no rebellious acts could annul, to a 
constitution. The Czar, however, treated such 
an opinion with high disdain. He not only 
insisted that he had the right of conquest to do 
as he pleased with Poland as with any other 
portion of his dominions, but in the teeth of 
France and England he revived the doctrine of 



FALSE ECONOMY. 171 

the Holy Alliance, denied the right of the Poles 
to a constitution, which he thought a free gift 
after the treaties had been settled. In this un- 
scrupulous interpretation of those solemn com- 
pacts he was supported by Prussia and Austria. 
It was clearly evinced by these three Powers, 
that the treaties of Vienna existed for their own 
peculiar use. and that England had nothing to 
do but to acquiesce in any meaning which an 
absolute sovereign might choose to put upon 
them. Thus while we paid the Russo-Dutch 
loan, even after Holland herself had refused to 
pay it, because we shrunk from the very shadow 
of a breach of faith pledged by one of those 
treaties, Russia did as she pleased with another, 
and England might remonstrate to her heart's 
content. 

We were obliged to submit to this affront in 
silence. War was of course out of the question. 
This was the golden era of the economists ; the 
Government professed peace and reform ; the 
army and navy estimates were diminished ; ships 
were laid up, and soldiers and sailors disbanded, 
that certain ministers might receive the applause 
of frugal politicians, who looked upon every far- 
thing spent on warlike objects as worse than 
thrown away. The year 1832 has been taken 
as one of the model years of these misnamed 



/ 



172 FOREIGN POLICY. 

economists. They have looked back on it in 
succeeding times with admiring despair. At no 
other period were the army and navy regarded 
with so little favour by the popular party in the 
House of Commons. The more the estimates were 
reduced, the more were the ministers cheered, 
and the more was their pacific policy praised. 
Every shilling that was saved, every pension 
that was abolished, and every reduction in 
military and naval establishments, was eagerly 
applauded, and considered as a tacit censure 
on the Duke of Wellington and former govern- 
ments. Even the administration of the army 
was interfered with; and popular orators, as 
in the days of the Commonwealth, resolutely 
endeavoured to control the Commander-in-Chief. 
That two millions were saved out of the esti- 
mates was thought the most brilliant financial 
triumph ever won by the genius of a Chancellor 
of the Exchequer, and it was eloquently extolled 
in leading articles. But much as this econo- 
mical feat was admired by members of great 
towns, it may be confidently pronounced that 
Count Nesselrode and the Emperor Nicholas 
were even still more delighted. 

While the Porte declined in strength, the 
Pasha of Egypt was growing more powerful than 
his nominal superior. In the conflict with 



THE PASHA OF EGYPT. 173 

Greece, the fleet and soldiers of Mehemet Ali 
were the mainstay of the Sultan's authority : and 
so ably had they been organised and commanded, 
that had not the great European nations inter- 
fered, Ibrahim Pasha must inevitably have 
reduced the Greeks to subjection. As Turkey 
was humbled in war with Russia, the Pasha of 
Egypt husbanded his resources, and gradually 
became in everything but in name, independent. 
This extraordinary man displayed such vigour 
and ability in conducting the affairs of his 
province, as would have distinguished the most 
illustrious statesmen of Europe. He had ren- 
dered great services to the Sultan, and as gene- 
rally happens in such cases, was dissatisfied with 
his position, and aspired to be something more 
than a subject to one who was scarcely able to de- 
fend himself. Ibrahim invaded Syria, defeated 
the armies of the neighbouring Pasha, took Acre, 
and in defiance of the commands of the Porte, 
led his victorious army to Damascus. He then 
proceeded to Aleppo, and drove before him all 
the troops with which the commanders of the 
different provinces attempted to stay his onward 
inarch. A brilliant victory opened to him the 
passes of the Taurus. Master of Syria, he de- 
scended into Karamania, and after a bloody con- 
flict routed the remaining forces of the Sultan 



174 FOREIGN POLICY. 

under the command of Redschid Pasha, who was 
himself wounded and taken prisoner. It seemed 
that the Eastern Problem was about to find an 
unexpected solution. There was nothing to 
prevent the Egyptian general from dictating 
terms to the Sultan under the walls of Constan- 
tinople. 

And now were seen the consequences of the 
system of economy which the English ministers 
had thought fit to pursue. The Sultan in this 
extremity applied to England for assistance ; he 
asked for a fleet, and the greatest naval power in 
the world had none to send. Our Government 
was obliged to make this humiliating confession, 
and the Sultan had no alternative but to accept 
the support of Russia. The Czar, more pro- 
vident than our statesmen, had ships and men at 
hand. The Russian fleet immediately entered 
the straits from the Black Sea ; fifteen thousand 
men were at once encamped at Scutari, and a 
powerful army was soon ready to cross the 
Danube. Turkey was thus thrown into the 
hands of her worst enemy. To get rid of his 
defenders, the Sultan consented to most of the 
terms of Mehemet Ali ; and before the Russian fleet 
and army left the Bosphorus, the Porte was com- 
pelled to agree to the celebrated treaty of Unkiar 
Skelessi, by which for eight years the Emperor 



THE TREATY OE UNKIAR SKELESSI. 175 

of Russia was in reality the master of Constan- 
tinople, the undisputed owner of the Black Sea, 
and the lord paramount of Turkey. He acquired 
the right of interference in the affairs of the 
Eastern Empire, made the Sultan his vassal, 
and shut the Dardanelles against his enemies. 
Through the infatuated economy of our re- 
formers, the Czar gained in peace more than he 
had done through years of successful war. The 
two millions which our Minister of Finance 
saved in the Army and Navy Estimates of 1832, 
had nearly all been recklessly taken from what 
was required to build new ships and to purchase 
new stores. With the exception of some two 
hundred thousand pounds from the army extra- 
ordinaries, and some miserable savings from the 
expenses of the militia, all this economy was a 
mere financial phantasmagoria. 

It was in vain that we blustered after the 
treaty of Unkiar Skelessi had come to light. It 
was in vain that we at last set to work to get 
ships ready for sea, and, in concert with France, 
sent them to the scene of action. It was in vain 
that after Count Orloff had triumphed, and the 
Russian forces had quitted Constantinople, taking 
the treaty away with them, that an English fleet 
sailed to the Dardanelles, from the Dardanelles 
went to Smyrna, and from Smyrna returned to 



176 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Malta/ Our economical reformers had been 
gratified. Our ministers had been praised for 
their carefulness of the public money. We had 
saved two millions. We had lost Turkey. Eng- 
land could only send a state paper when Russia 
sent line-of-battle ships. 

The blame of this economical imprudence 
must principally fall on the Ministers. It is 
no excuse that they yielded to the wishes of their 
supporters, or even to a majority in the House 
of Commons. It cannot be too strongly incul- 
cated that the Ministers who sacrifice the vital 
interests of the State to gain a little present 
popularity, are more deserving of the condemn- 
ation of posterity, than the most reckless dema- 
gogue who propounds schemes which he in his 
heart believes to be pernicious to his country. 
All the members of the first Reform Ministry 
must bear some portion of the blame which at- 
taches to them for their want of foresight. 
Although there can be no doubt that Lord Palm er- 
st on was not personally favourable to those reduc- 
tions in the estimates, the effect of which was to 
render our navy inefficient at a most important 
political crisis, and to deliver the Sultan bound 
hand and foot to the mercy of the Czar of Russia, 
the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs must- 
take his share of the censure which falls upon 






EFFECTS OF FALSE ECONOMY. 177 

the Cabinet. It was especially the duty of the 
statesman entrusted with the management of 
Foreign Affairs not to consent to any measure 
which might diminish the moral weight of Eng- 
land, and prevent her from fulfilling the impor- 
tant obligations which might devolve upon her as 
the richest and the most eminent member of the 
great commonwealth of nations. Had it not been 
for the vigorous exertions of the French ambas- 
sador, Count Orloff would at that time have suc- 
ceeded in obtaining for his sovereign all that 
could have been requisite for paving the way of 
Nicholas to Constantinople. 

The danger to Western Europe was not, how- 
ever, so great as it would have been two years 
earlier. England and France were friends ; and 
although in no condition to wage an unexpected 
war, might soon have wrested by force of arms 
all the acquisitions of skilful diplomacy from 
their jealous and watchful antagonist. They 
were even at that time frustrating in Greece the 
deeply laid scheme for making the new kingdom 
a mere dependency of the Kussian Empire. 

The Turks had scarcely left the Morea when 
the Greeks began to quarrel among themselves. 
The President of the unorganised monarchy was 
the dexterous agent of Eussia. For a time it 
seemed that all the endeavours for the freedom 

N 



178 FOREIGN POLICY. 

of Greece would end in giving them another 
tyrant. A civil war broke out. The chiefs of 
the islands rebelled, and the Russian fleet was 
actively engaged on the side of the President. 
But Capo d'Istrias fell under the dagger of the 
assassin, and his brother was unable to establish 
the government. Lord Palmerston saw that 
there was no hope of quiet or liberty for Greece 
until he could send them a King, and exerted him- 
self to bring the negotiations, which had been so 
long pending, to a successful termination. It 
was the interest both of England and France 
that a sovereign should be chosen out of a sin- 
cerely constitutional family, and it was thought 
that if the limits of the State could be extended, 
there would be less probability of Russian intrigues 
prevailing. The Czar had, indeed, thrown many 
difficulties in the way of a final settlement. But 
Lord Palmerston had more sanguine hopes of 
Greek patriotism and virtue than Lord Aberdeen. 
His energy and perseverance at length succeeded. 
He had the gratification of seeing the gulfs of 
Yolo and Arta decided upon as the boundary of 
emancipated Greece, though this increase of 
territory was purchased from the Porte for half 
a million. The credit of England, with that of 
the other two Powers, was pledged for three 
additional millions ; thus, as usual, the English 



THE NEW KINGDOM OF GREECE. 179 

sympathy for freedom ended in a loan ; and the 
young King, little prescient of Don Pacifico, 
prepared to meet his illustrious subjects, who 
promised him that the Muses would in person 
descend from Helicon to bid him welcome. 

He arrived at Athens, and Greece was tran- 
quillised. But much yet remained to be done 
before a constitutional government, deserving of 
the name, could be established ; ten years more 
of delay in preparing a real constitution, with 
representative chambers, passed by before the 
expectation of English Liberals could be at all 
realised. The finishing touches to this monarch}/- 
had not been given before the game of foreign 
factions commenced ; the union of the three 
Powers was dissolved ; and the welfare of 
Greece sacrificed to the momentary ascend- 
ancy of France or Russia. The kingdom of 
Greece may be considered a failure, but that 
failure is no reproach to Lord Palmerston, 
nor even to constitutional government. The 
state of Greece has never had a fair trial. If it 
has failed, the reason is that neither Russia nor 
France would permit it to succeed. The Czar \ 
from the first only intended that the new King 
should be a puppet of his own, and the French 
monarch, when he at length thought fit to with- 
draw from a close intimacy with England, en- 

N 2 



180 FOKEIGN TOLIOY. 

deavoured by every means to counteract the 
influence of our Foreign Minister in Greece as 
I |n other countries. 

Lord Palmers ton had just time to congratulate 
himself on the success of his efforts in the 
Peloponnesus when other struggling constitu- 
tionalists required his care. Civil war once 
more raged both in Portugal and Spain. Don 
Pedro had returned to Europe determined to 
assert the rights of his daughter to the crown of 
Portugal, and Don Carlos was fully resolved to 
dispute with his niece the possession of the 
Spanish throne. By a singular coincidence, 
there were two female sovereigns under age, and 
opposed by two uncles who wished to deprive 
them of their crowns. Don Miguel had at least 
the semblance of popular support ; he reigned in 
some sort through the will of the people ; and 
though he was stained with many crimes, he was 
at least for a time, the King of Portugal. But 
Don Carlos had never sat on the throne of Spain. 
His claim was founded on the Salic Law, which 
had been introduced by the Bourbons, and 
was no part of the old national law of the 
monarchy. It had even been formally repealed. 
Though his right had been once acknowledged 
by the will of Ferdinand, and by a decree of the 
Cortes, a more recent will of the same King, and 



SPAIN AND PORTUGAL. 181 

a more recent decree of the same assembly, had 
annulled their former declarations. What they 
had given, they had also taken away. The same 
authority that had once recognised the pretensions 
of Carlos, had subsequently declared them void. 
The eldest daughter of Ferdinand was clearly sove- 
reign of Spain. When the adherents of Donna 
Maria and her father took possession of Lisbon, 
and she was proclaimed Queen, Don Miguel was 
no longer by any title King of Portugal. It is to 
be feared that neither the regent Don Pedro nor 
the regent Queen Christina were devoted to con- 
stitutional principles. But circumstances made it 
necessary for them to seek the support of those 
who professed liberal opinions, and their cause 
was supported by all who wished to see des- 
potisms overthrown and constitutions established. 
Lord Palmerston had now, as in the case of 
Greece, an opportunity of carrying into practice 
the principles which he had professed in oppo- 
sition. Though the governments of France and 
England declared themselves neutral in these 
civil contests of the Peninsula, they unequivo- 
cally showed to which cause they wished success. 
The Spanish constitution had been overthrown 
by the French Legitimists ; the new King of 
France could therefore only desire to see it re- 
stored. Don Miguel, while he held power in 

N 3 



182 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Portugal, had persecuted the subjects of France 
and England, and the fleets of both countries had 
separately demanded reparation in the waters of 
the Tagus. Don Carlos had been obliged to fly 
from Spain, and had joined Don Miguel m 
Portugal. The cause of the two pretenders, as 
of the two young queens, was evidently the same. 
On the one side were despotism, usurpation, and 
ecclesiastical tyranny ; on the other hereditary 
right, constitutional government, and religious 
toleration. 

The English people at that day strongly sym- 
pathised with the Spanish and Portuguese patriots. 
"While Don Miguel ruled in Portugal and the 
constitutionalists were expelled from Spain, the 
political exiles naturally sought refuge on our 
shores. Numbers of those dark, mustached, 
picturesque strangers might be met in Kegent 
Street and Oxford Street. Subscriptions were 
raised for them ; fathers of families were pestered 
by enthusiastic acquaintances to permit unfor- 
tunate refugees to teach their children the lan- 
guages of the Peninsula. What the Hungarian 
is now in England, those who fled from the 
tyranny of Ferdinand and Miguel were five and 
twenty years ago. 

When the news arrived that Don Pedro was 
maintaining himself successfully in Oporto, that 



SPAIN AND PORTUGAL. 183 

a gallant English sailor had destroyed the fleet 
of Miguel, that the Spaniards were bent on 
restoring their constitution, defending their 
young Queen, and resisting that instrument of 
absolutism and of the priesthood, Don Carlos, 
the people of England heartily rejoiced. A field 
was opened to ambition. Reports were spread 
of young adventurous Englishmen becoming at 
one step generals in the service of Isabella and 
Donna Maria. 

The English Government gave every encou- 
ragement to the restless multitude who were so 
eager to fight the battles of the Queens on the 
Peninsula. Checkmated at Constantinople, 
Lord Palmerston was victorious at Madrid. 
Early in 1834, the despotic Powers had another 
Congress at Vienna, but very different from the 
great meeting of 1814. In those twenty years 
the world had rolled on notwithstanding all the 
efforts which kings and ministers had made to 
stop it. Austria, Russia, and Prussia were now 
obliged to content themselves with agreeing to 
deliver up any disaffected subjects of their re- 
spective crowns. Though the Conference at 
Vienna was represented as a revival of the Holy 
Alliance, and the questions discussed were kept 
secret, this league of despotism was no longer 
what it had lately been. It was met by our 

N 4 



184 FOREIGN POLICY. 

ministers with a constitutional league of the four 
Western States, and Europe now seemed divided 
by treaty, as it had long been by opinion, into 
two opposite political systems. On the side of 
absolute power were seen Austria, Prussia, and 
Eussia ; on the side of popular government, 
England, France, Spain, and Portugal. Lord 
Palmerston had repeatedly asserted that consti- 
tutional states were the natural allies of Eng- 
land, and now was displayed for the first time 
in European history the two forms of govern- 
ment decidedly arrayed against each other. The 
Quadruple Treaty followed so closely after the 
assembly of the despotic sovereigns at Vienna, 
that it must be regarded as an answer to it on 
the part of France and England. 

By this treaty we engaged to assist the two 
regents of Spain and Portugal with a naval 
force to establish the power of their governments 
throughout the Peninsula. France agreed to 
do whatever might be thought necessary to aid 
in this good work. Nothing was said about 
constitutions in the treaty, though it was under- 
stood that it was a constitutional alliance of the 
Four Courts. As such Lord Palmerston con- 
sidered it, and such he proudly called it in the 
House of Commons. 

On the wisdom of this policy there were diff- 
erent opinions. The Ministers were accused of 



THE QUADRUPLE ALLIANCE. 185 

departing from the principle of non-intervention, 
which even Mr. Canning had asserted in 1822, 
and which Lord Palmerston had then defended. 
The Foreign Secretary replied that there was no 
resemblance between the two cases. In 1822 an 
army of two hundred thousand men invaded 
Spain. Had we then interfered, we must have 
gone to war with both France and Spain. Now 
there were no large armies to contend against, 
nor was it necessary for England to go to war ; 
the Government had only given British subjects 
permission to enter the service of the Queen of 
Spain. Don Carlos was our enemy. It was an 
English interest that the Queen of Spain should 
succeed. The phrases " Constitutional Spain, " 
and "Constitutional Portugal," were emphatically 
and expressly used by Lord Palmerston in dis- 
cussing this question. The triumph of Donna 
Maria and Isabella the Second was considered as 
a triumph of the constitution. 

And such it was. Our constitutional allies 
thought fit, as their dominions were more settled 
and their thrones more firmly established, to 
forget some of the liberal professions which they 
had made in their hour of adversity. Those 
who expected to see the Peninsula become a 
perfect pattern of constitutional freedom were 
egregiously disappointed ; and, judging the design 
by the result, they have represented the Quad- 



186 FOREIGN POLICY. 

ruple Treaty and the subsequent endeavours Lord 
Palmerston made for the Queen of Spain, as 
futile works, neither ably planned nor ably ex- 
ecuted. This condemnation is unjust. The 
design of our great constitutional artificer was 
good ; the materials he was obliged to work with 
were not of the very highest qualities ; but the 
groundwork of a just, liberal, and beneficent 
form of government was laid down, and may in 
the end be the foundation of a glorious constitu- 
tional edifice. Justice will then be done to the 
patriotism, integrity, wisdom and foresight of 
the English Minister. The small carping 
critics who expect impossibilities, and on being 
disappointed are dissatisfied with everything, 
will be forgotten. Better days are yet to 
come for Spain and Portugal. Kegents, minis- 
ters, and sovereigns pass away like shadows ; 
but those noble germinations of national life 
which are nurtured even amid the imperfections 
of a constitutional monarchy, may one day be 
developed, and the Peninsula become the happy 
abode of public freedom. 

Opinions govern mankind. Since the great 
despotic and barbaric power of the North sets 
itself resolutely to support the arbitrary govern- 
ments of the world, it is surely wise policy in an 
English minister to endeavour to diffuse the 



THE HOLY ALLIANCE. 187 

blessings of constitutional government. This is 
the only effectual method of frustrating the 
ambition of Russia, and of securing the nation- 
ality of Western Europe. The Emperor of all the 
Russias discovered this truth long ago ; hence the 
Holy Alliance, and the jealousy with which the 
least indication of popular ascendency in the 
West has been watched. A people who acquire 
freedom, must, on the day when their liberties 
are secured, become the natural enemies of 
Russia, and the natural allies of England. 
This Prince Metternich never knew, notwith- 
standing his sagacity and experience ; and 
therefore all his efforts for opposing the onward 
march of the Czar have been futile, and he has 
had the mortification of seeing his country, the 
more the absolute system was remorselessly 
carried out, sink by degrees, until it seemed a 
mere dependency of her unscrupulous neighbour, 
who was in secret the most deadly foe of 
Austria. When the Russian influence was most 
predominant at Vienna, the proceedings of the 
Austrian Court were most tyrannical ; and should 
Austria ever become the cordial and fervent ally 
of England, she must first, in self-defence, adopt 
at home a more liberal, generous, and national 
policy. It is a mistake to suppose that Austria 
was the prime mover in putting down the con- 



188 FOREIGN POLICY. 

stitutionalists of Naples ; it was Alexander of 
Russia who inspired the deluded statesmen of 
the Empire with the design, and allowed them 
to mulct the Kingdom of Naples of two hundred 
millions of francs as the price of that precious 
assistance.* Thus it has ever been. Austria 
has frequently had the odium of measures of 
which her insidious ally has been the projector. 
Don Carlos and Don Miguel were both avowedly 
in friendly communication with Russia, and had 
they been victorious, must have been mere agents 
of Nicholas. The possession of the Peninsula 
would have been anything but a contemptible 
acquisition ; at the very least it might have 
weakened the antagonistic attitude of Western 
Europe. Even the King of Naples counts for 
somebody among the potentates of the world : 
it would be better to see him the friend of Eng- 
land than the friend of Russia ; and he too may 
yet be ungrateful to his illustrious master. 

After endeavouring to give a rapid summary 

* Count Pozzo di Borgo, in 1828, when the policy of 
Metternich was decidedly hostile to Russia, bitterly accuses 
him of ingratitude to the benefactor of Austria, and mentions 
Alexander as the monarch who really " dispelled the revo- 
lutionary storm" in Naples, and overthrew the Carbonari. — 
(Despatch of the 28th November, 1828.) 



LORD PALMERSTON AS FOKEIGN MINISTER. 189 

of the most important affairs in which Lord 
Palmerston took such a prominent part during 
the first four years of his management of the 
Foreign Office, it must be candidly acknowledged 
that his actions, though not always successful, 
bore honourable testimony to his energy, pa- 
triotism, and sagacity. The treaty of Unkiar 
Skelessi was indeed a grievous blow to England, 
and cannot but be regarded as discreditable to 
the Whig Government. But the truth is, that 
Lord Palmerston had not attained an ascendancy 
in the cabinet of the Reform Ministry ; beyond 
the sphere of his department he had little influ- 
ence, and he was not, like many of his associates, 
an enthusiastic economist. His great abilities 
were not generally recognised. He was only super- 
ciliously tolerated by the noisiest of his colleagues 
who had not recovered from the excitement of 
the Reform Bill, and looked upon the Govern- 
ment of England as their exclusive right for at 
least half a century to come. J They had not 
learnt the important political truth, that there 
are times and occasions when the best thing a 
minister can do, is to do nothing. It would 
have been well had they allowed the agitation 
to settle down ; but they blindly hurried on, 
until many of their moderate supporters took 
fright, and even the King, whom they had counted 



x 



190 FOREIGN POLICY. 

upon as their own, turned wistful glances to 
Sir Eobert Peel and the Duke of Wellington. 
The great majorities of the Whigs soon dimin- 
ished even in a Parliament of their own choosing. 
That a Conservative administration was con- 
sidered for a moment possible, two years and 
a half after the great Bill had been passed, 
shows how much more cautious the people were 
than their rulers. 

But Lord Palmerston had little to do with 
the particular questions which frightened many 
moderate politicians, nor with the personal quar- 
rels which almost sealed the fate of the ministry. 
His foreign policy had certainly been in 1833 
directly censured by the Lords; but a counter 
vote had been called for in the other House and 
responded to by the Commons. He proceeded on 
his course. Warlike as his policy was thought, 
he boasted, and justly boasted, some years later, 
of having, amid dangers of every kind, amid wars 
and rumours of wars, preserved the peace of 
Europe. When he accepted office war seemed 
so inevitable that a friend told him that though 
an angel were to come down from heaven 
and write his despatches, peace could not be 
maintained for three months longer. Nearly 
four years however had passed away, and still 
there had been no message from the Throne 



PEACE AT ANY PRICE. 191 

informing the two Estates that His Majesty 
had found it necessary to prepare for hostilities. 
But this is not the highest praise which the 
minister fairly deserves. Not only had he pre- 
served tranquillity, not only had he scrupulously 
kept faith with other governments, not only had 
he strictly adhered to all obligations, but though 
occupying a seat in a cabinet pledged to peace, 
reform, and retrenchment, he had adopted a 
high tone to other nations, and shown himself 
jealous of the dignity of England, and a sturdy 
guardian of her honour. To declaim on the 
evils of war is the easiest of all mechanical 
exercises. Even the composition of a set of 
affecting commonplaces on the blessings of 
peace requires scarcely a more brilliant exertion 
of human genius. From the proceedings of the 
Peace Society contrasted with the energy and 
ability of the statesmen whom Mr. Cobden has 
repeatedly accused of warlike tendencies, we 
may learn that an avowedly pacific policy is not 
unlikely to produce war; and that while the 
nature of man remains as it is and has been 
since the creation, a too eager desire to maintain 
peace at any price is sure to end in war at any 
price. Lord Palmerston has proved by experi- 
ence that an English minister can only negotiate 
successfully with jealous, overbearing, and hos- 



192 FOREIGN POLICY. 

tile governments, while he lets it plainly be seen 
that the friendship of England is worth culti- 
vating, and her enmity to be dreaded. In the 
interest of peace itself, while holding out the 
olive-branch in one hand, he must with the 
other firmly grasp the sword. 



193 



CHAP. VII. 

CONDUCT OF THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON WHILE FOREIGN 

MINISTER. — INTERFERENCE IN SPAIN. DIFFICULTIES OF 

A LIBERAL MINISTER NEGOTIATING WITH ABSOLUTE GO- 
VERNMENTS. — CHOICE OF AN AMBASSADOR TO ST. PETERS- 
BURG. THE EMPEROR NICHOLAS AND THE HOUSE OF 

COMMONS. — A GRADUAL CHANGE OF OPINION ON FOREIGN 

POLICY. — PRECARIOUS STATE OF TURKEY. ARROGANCE 

AND HUMILIATION. DISCUSSIONS ON FOREIGN POLICY IN 

1836. MR. BELL AND CHtCASSIA. MR. URQLHART. 

PATRIOTISM OF WILLIAM THE FOURTH. 

The short administration of Sir Robert Peel was 
not distinguished by any important measures of 
foreign policy. But this interregnum showed 
that the policy of England did not depend on 
the mere personal inclinations of any Minister, 
however eminent ; for though the Duke of Wel- 
lington was Foreign Secretary, and though he 
disapproved of the Quadruple Treaty, Lord 
Palmerston himself confessed, on again returning 
to office, that the Duke had fairly carried out 
the principles of the former Whig Government. 
He did more. He endeavoured to make the 
contending parties of the Peninsula adopt a 
more merciful mode of warfare than they had 
hitherto acted upon, and b^ proposing a con- 

o 



194 FOREIGN POLICY. 

vention by which a cartel for the exchange of 
prisoners was regulated, attempted to put an end 
to those murders in cold blood of which both 
factions were alternately the perpetrators and 
the victims. 

After a few months of opposition, the Whigs 
returned in triumph to the ministerial benches. 
The secret intrigues of that factious period have 
not yet been fully divulged ; but it is certain 
that Lord Palmerston's return to the Foreign 
Department was not the matter of course which 
it has generally been assumed. Many of the 
Whig statesmen had long been engaged in pa- 
triotically undermining and thwarting each 
other; and even their proud and high-minded 
chief, Earl Grey, felt himself the object of much 
private jealousy. It is not then surprising that 
the Foreign Secretaryship was offered by Lord 
Melbourne to Lord John Russell, and that it 
was only after the Leader of the House of 
Commons had declined it, and selected another 
post in the Government, that Lord Palmerston 
was again appointed to the Foreign Office. 

He at once turned his attention to Spain. 
The civil war in that romantic kingdom was a 
slow fever; neither party had energy to subdue 
the other ; the military operations were feeble ; 
there was no tone in the political body. It was 
only in committing crimes that the leaders 



INTERFERENCE IN SPAIN. 195 

showed themselves able and resolute. When 
England agreed to assist the Queen of Spain to 
establish peace in her dominions, it is clear that 
although the Ministers only undertook to aid 
the Spanish Constitutionalists with a naval force, 
that in the event of tranquillity not being speedily 
established, they could not refuse to make still 
further efforts in the cause of the Queen. The 
distinction which the opponents of Lord Pal- 
merston's policy made between a land and a 
naval force, was not very satisfactory. It 
was a distinction without a difference. We had 
unquestionably interfered for the purpose of 
supporting the daughter of Ferdinand ; and the 
honour of the nation demanded that our inter- 
ference should be effectual. The true objection 
to the Order in Council by which the Foreign 
Enlistment Act was suspended, and still more to 
the equipment of the Spanish Legion, was that 
the means were not the best to attain the end 
that was proposed. But they were the best that 
Lord Palmerston had it in his power to employ. 
The French Government, after having at first 
put its hand to this work, thought fit in 1836 to 
look back : for the first time since the accession of 
the Orleans dynasty, a serious difference on this 
subject occurred between the two Cabinets ; and 

Lord Palmerston was left to his own resources. 

o 2 



196 FOREIGN POLICY. 

It was not then his fault, if he did not adopt 
more decisive and efficient measures, for secur- 
ing the success of his policy in Spain. 

Sufficient allowance has never been made 
for the peculiar and unprecedented difficulties 
which beset Lord Palmerston on every side while 
he was Foreign Secretary under the Adminis- 
trations of Earl Grey and Lord Melbourne. A 
great popular revolution had just been accom- 
plished at home. A sudden change in the exe- 
cutive had followed the recent change in the 
representative portion of the Legislature. The 
Foreign Minister of a Reform Cabinet had to 
walk in new and untrodden ways. The old 
diplomatic path of his predecessors was closed to 
him ; for, as a Liberal statesman, from the mo- 
ment of taking office, he became the object of 
distrust to one half of the governments of 
Europe. No diplomatic phrases, no general pro- 
fessions, could efface the consciousness that the 
principles of his party were diametrically op- 
posed to the cherished designs of the despotic 
Courts. This antagonism was a fact. Some of 
the most distinguished Whigs had all their lives 
severely reprobated the measures of the kings 
and emperors of the Continent. They had at 
length come into power when all Europe was in 
a state of revolt and excitement, and when the 
popular mind of England was deeply agitated. 



AMBASSADOR TO RUSSIA. 197 

Lord Palmerston found himself denounced as a 
friend of despotism because he was compelled to 
accept the treaties of which his own colleagues 
and their supporters had disapproved. On the 
other hand, he was looked upon as a revolutionary 
firebrand, because he would not acquiesce in the 
tyrannical proceedings of Austria and Russia. 
Do what he might, he was sure to offend the 
prejudices either of those who had long been 
regarded as the allies of this country, or of those 
enthusiastic champions of Liberal principles who 
could not understand that their theories must 
admit of -some compromise if they were to be at 
all applied to the mixed condition of good and 
evil which ever pervades all human, and espe- 
cially all political, affairs. 

The extraordinary obstacles which the Foreign 
Secretary everywhere met with, cannot be better 
exemplified than by relating the perplexities 
which attended the selection of an ambassador to 
Russia. 

When the Whigs came into office, Lord Heytes- 
bury was the representative of England at the 
Court of St. Petersburg. He was asked to 
remain, though his political opinions were not 
exactly those of the Ministers. In the autumn 
of 1832 he was, however, compelled to retire 
through bodily indisposition. In times of quiet 

o 3 






198 FOREIGN POLICY. 

and regular government, it would not have been 
difficult to find a successor. But this was not 
such a period, and the English^ Ministers had a 
most delicate task to perform. Lord Palmerston 
appointed 'Sir Stratford Canning as ambassador 
to Eussia ; /and a better choice, so far as England 
was concerned, could not possibly have been 
made. This diplomatist had long been familiar 
with all the secrets of Russian intrigue ; and 
'was known to be attached to a Liberal policy. 
His merits were fully recognised in England, 
and they were also recognised by the Emperor 
Nicholas, who, as soon as he learned that Sir 
Stratford Canning had been fixed upon as the 
successor of Lord Heytesbury, immediately in- 
formed Lord Palmerston that the new ambassador 
was not agreeable to him, and that he would not 
be received. The Minister was thrown into 
a dilemma. If he chose another person for the 
post, he admitted the right of the Emperor of 
Russia to annul a diplomatic appointment of 
the King of England. But it was of course 
impossible for the ambassador to proceed to 
St. Petersburg. Lord Palmerston contented 
himself with giving a silent protest against this 
somewhat unexpected and arrogant interpo- 
sition. No other person was substituted ; and 
until the Duke of Wellington and Sir Robert 



CHOICE OF AMBASSADOR. 199 

Peel formed their Government, England neither 
had, nor was prepared to have, an ambassador 
in Eussia. Yet it was during this interval that 
the Treaty of Unkiar Skelessi and the subsequent 
Treaty of St. Petersburg were negotiated, which 
materially affected the interests of Europe and 
the balance of power. 

The Duke of Wellington was not satisfied with 
the reasons which had induced the late Foreign 
Secretary not to acquiesce in the objections of 
Nicholas. He thought that, as an independent 
sovereign, the Emperor of Eussia had a right to 
decide whether he would or would not receive 
any individual who had been appointed by an- 
other Court as its representative in his dominions. 
He determined on immediately sending an am- 
bassador. The Marquis of Londonderry was 
chosen, when the Duke met with a difficulty 
quite as unexpected as, and not altogether dis- 
similar from, that which had prevented Lord 
Palmerston from sending Sir Stratford Canning. 

The Marquis of Londonderry was the brother 
and heir of the late Lord Castlereagh, to whose 
title, indeed, he succeeded. He professed great 
veneration for his deceased relative, fully adopted 
his principles of foreign policy, and looked upon 
him as the wisest and most brilliant of states- 
men. Every departure from his brother's poli- 

o 4 






200 FOREIGN POLICY. 

tical system the noble Marquis had passionately 
condemned. His opinion was, that our only 
safety depended on a stedfast adherence to the 
arrangements of the Congress of Vienna, and on 
keeping England firmly united with the arbi- 
trary powers of Europe. On a very recent 
occasion, he had spoken contemptuously of the 
sympathy for Poland which was so prevalent in 
France and England, and which our Ministers had 
not cared to conceal. He had, in defiance of ihe 
Liberal members in both Houses, emphatically 
called the Poles rebels. When his appointment 
as ambassador was known, a cry of indignation 
arose, and the noble Marquis and the, Emperor 
of Russia were taught a memorable lesson. It 
was soon seen that even the brother of Lord 
Castlereagh, the Duke of Wellington, and all the 
weight of the Ministry, could not offer a success- 
ful resistance to the popular spirit which had 
been infused into the foreign policy. It was 
soon seen that if the Emperor Nicholas was 
powerful, the Commons of England were not 
quite impotent. 

Mr. Sheil moved for a copy of the appoint- 
ment. In an eloquent and sarcastic speech, he 
detailed the aggressions of Russia, and showed 
that the noble Marquis was not a fit person to 
be sent to St. Petersburg as the ambassador of 



NICHOLAS AND THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 201 

England. Some even of the Ministerial papers 
ventured to regret the choice which the Duke 
of Wellington had made ; and Lord Stanley, who, 
on other questions, was gradually separating 
himself from the Whigs, and growing every day 
more friendly to Sir Kobert Peel and the Conser- 
vative party, rose during the debate and said that 
he could not but consider the appointment ex- 
tremely improper. Sir Robert Peel made a dex- 
terous speech in reply; but it was impossible even 
for him, with all his powers for debate, to meet 
the real point at issue. In his celebrated Tam- 
worth Manifesto, and in the debate on the Ad- 
dress, he had pledged himself to carry out the 
foreign policy of the Whig Government. Yet 
it was notorious that the Marquis of London- 
derry was in every respect opposed to that 
policy, that he gloried in his opposition, that he 
was the enemy of Poland, and now even the 
enemy of Turkey. Lie had declared, most ab- 
surdly, that the Emperor of Russia had a right 
to do as he pleased in Turkey, since England 
had chosen to take her own course in Belgium. 
He had spoken with contempt of the friendship 
of France, and had condemned our interference 
in Spain. As the appointment had not been 
officially made out, the motion was of course not 
formally carried. But the discussion had pro- 



202 FOREIGN POLICY. 

duced a great effect. It was clear that though 
Sir Robert Peel had said that he would not ad- 
vise the Crown to cancel the appointment, Lord 
Londonderry was almost as effectually stopped 
from proceeding to St. Petersburg as Sir Strat- 
ford Canning had been. On the next evening, 
without communicating with the Government, the 
Marquis declared that it was impossible for him 
now with any propriety to undertake his mission. 
The Duke of Wellington said that such an inter- 
ference as that which the House of Commons 
had made, was an attack on the prerogative of the 
Crown. And such, in a certain sense, it was. 
And such, in a certain and even worse sense, 
since no just cause for the objection could be 
alleged, was the veto which the Czar had pro- 
nounced on the appointment of Sir Stratford 
Canning. Thus diamond cut diamond ; and a 
reformed House of Commons gave the presump- 
tuous Autocrat a Roland for his Oliver. 

The experience of a few years had done much 
to -awaken the English Parliament to the real 
position of Turkey and Russia. It is evident 
that even Lord Palmerston had much more 
decided opinions on this subject, than when his 
speech of the 1st of June 1829 excited the 
admiration of the Emperor Nicholas. The 
English Liberals had fully withdrawn from 



CHANGE OF OPINION. 203 

the false position into which they were driven 
by their generous, but unwise, sympathies 
for the Greeks. Freedom of some sort the 
modern Athenian patriots had undoubtedly 
gained; but it had cost a considerable sum of 
money ; and now, as in the days when a horror 
of Republicanism had allied our government 
with despotism, England had to pay by far the 
greater portion of the bill. The economists 
grumbled, and forgot their diffusive liberalism; 
Lord Palmerston, on more than one occasion, 
was obliged to remind them of the pecuniary 
obligations which they had contracted when it 
w^as the fashion to speak of the Greeks as dis- 
playing " the energy of their fathers." The 
days when a noble poet might hope, by taking 
part in the Greek insurrection, to regain the 
popularity which he lost by his licentiousness, 
and when an allusion to the patriotism of the 
Greeks was sure to be the climax of every speech 
in favour of freedom, were gone by. Orators 
no longer rounded their periods with the happy 
alliteration of Missolonghi and Marathon. The 
name of Sultan Mahmoud was no longer men- 
tioned with execration. Englishmen began to 
be sensible of the great stake which they had 
depending on the fate of the Turkish Empire. 
The despatches taken from Warsaw were being 






204 FOREIGN POLICY. 

published in The Portfolio, and though this 
publication was, as a commercial speculation, 
unsuccessful, and though there was necessarily 
much exaggeration and extravagance in its pages, 
as unfortunately there ever are in whatever its 
enthusiastic, but not very diplomatic, proprietor 
undertakes, it unquestionably did much good 
among the select few who thought it deserving 
of attention. There was evidence enough of the 
designs of Russia, and of the unscrupulous 
manner in which they were being carried out ; 
and the public were now convinced of what 
would be the consequences of her success in the 
East. 

It was time. Turkey had grown, while the 
ignorance of England lasted, almost a Russian 
province, and in a short time, had this indiffer- 
ence continued, must have really become one, 
without honourable members being aware that 
anything particular had happened. The Dar- 
danelles were effectually closed to us. Russian 
troops garrisoned Silistria. It was to Russia 
alone that the Sultan could look for assistance 
against the premeditated attacks of a powerful 
vassal. Russian medals were even being dis- 
tributed, by the express command of Nicholas, 
among the Turkish soldiers./ 

Nothing could be more "transparent than the 



PRECARIOUS STATE OF TURKEY. 205 

motive of the Russian Emperor in sending 
these medals. It was for the purpose of making 
the Sultan odious to his own subjects, and par- 
ticularly to all sincere Mahometans, who would 
thus clearly see that the venerated chief of their 
race and religion was the mere dependent of a 
detested, an infidel, a hostile sovereign. Even 
at this last extremity, the Sultan ventured to 
resist the mandates of his artful protector. A 
whole year elapsed, and the medals were still 
in the possession of the government. At first 
the Russian ambassador gently reminded the 
Sultan of the gifts which his generous master 
had sent to the Faithful who had been the com- 
panions of the Cossacks in the camp at Unkiar 
Skelessi. He entreated ; he insinuated the dis- 
pleasure of the Emperor ; then he covertly 
threatened ; and at length he openly bullied. 
The Sultan, having no confidence at this time 
in the ready assistance of the Western Powers, 
though he knew well that these medals were 
really, and were intended to be, mere badges of 
servitude, and might even provoke an insurrection 
in the streets of Constantinople, was at last 
obliged to comply. The most insolent con- 
queror never imposed harder conditions on the 
most abject foe, than Russia now, in a period 
of peace and with professions of friendship, 
drove the Sultan to fulfil. 



206 FOREIGN POLICY. 

An English ambassador was indeed wanted 
at St. Petersburg \ and Lord Palmerston at last 
chose the Earl of Durham for that very arduous 
office. Both France and England had vainly 
protested against their exclusion from the Dar- 
danelles. They both requested permission for 
an armed vessel of each nation to enter the 
Black Sea ; the one for scientific purposes, the 
other for the conveyance of our ambassador 
to Persia through the Straits to Trebisond. 
Both Governments were virtually refused ; and 
the answers to their requests were in both 
instances dictated to the Sultan by the Eussian 
ambassador. 

Lord Palmerston tried the experiment again 
when the Earl of Durham was proceeding to 
Eussia. He took the route of the Black Sea. 
He was received with great courtesy by the 
Sultan, but found that the prohibition was still 
resolutely enforced. A Eussian man-of-war, 
with her colours proudly flaunting in the breeze, 
saluted the vessel which carried the English 
ambassador, and which had not a single gun on 
her decks to return the courtesy. All the artil- 
lery of the English ship had been landed at the 
Dardanelles, or had been stowed away in the 
hold. The virtue of submission on the one side, 
and the vice of arrogance on the other, could 



ARROGANCE AND HUMILIATION. 207 

scarcely be carried further. But beneath even 
this depth there was a lower deep. When the 
Earl of Durham approached Odessa, not a shot 
was fired in honour of the presence of the 
English ambassador. On his remonstrating, 
the governor affirmed that it was all a mistake ; 
but such omissions never happen by mistake. 
It was one of those petty insults which the 
sovereign of a great Empire seems to delight in 
offering. As no person is too high for the 
hostility of the Emperor of Russia, so no one is 
too low. An ambassador and a waiting-maid are 
equally the objects of his attention. To aim 
at the empire of the world, and not to disdain 
the acquisition of an ice-house ; to be at once 
mighty in his ends and paltry in his means, are 
the characteristics of this imperial crusader of 
the nineteenth century. 

Such repeated indignities as England received 
at this time, would in any other age have inevit- 
ably caused war. The peace was, however, still 
unbroken. The calamities which all Europe 
had suffered in the last tremendous conflict for 
empire and dominion had been so terrible and 
so protracted, that the civilised nations of the 
West shrunk from the responsibility of again 
disturbing the apparent tranquillity of the world, 
and many respectable and most conscientious 



208 FOREIGN POLICY. 

people began to feel a horror, which may be 
justly called irrational and effeminate, at the 
mere prospect of war. 

A judicious observer might have felt con- 
vinced that the national spirit would again 
promptly display itself whenever it was rightly 
invoked. This sentimental dread of war has 
indeed not unfrequently been most prevalent 
just before the rupture of peace, and in the 
history of England it may be seen that imme- 
diately before the commencement of their most 
glorious conflicts with despotism and oppression, 
Englishmen have been most mistrustful of their 
strength, and least sanguine about the conse- 
quences of hostilities. There are not wanting 
instances of prime ministers having confidently 
predicted a long era of peace a few months 
before great wars, which agitated the whole world, 
have broken out. In the year 1790 before the 
commencement of the war against French Re- 
volution, which drew England and so many 
nations into its mighty vortex, Mr. Pitt's speech 
on the introduction of his budget was a magni- 
ficent ode on the brilliant prospects of peace which 
he expected to continue unbroken for a long 
period . 

An attentive observer might have seen that, 
notwithstanding all the pacific professions of the 



discussions in 1836. 209 

Whig Ministers and their liberal supporters, that 
a war with Russia was sure one day to come. 
In all parts of the globe the two nations met in 
opposition, and the greatest forbearance and 
circumspection were necessary at every step 
which Lord Palmerston took. 

The year 1836 deserves especial mention as 
one in which the House of Commons showed 
unequivocally that hostility to the ambition 
of the Czar, which was now more and more 
forced upon every considerate statesman. The 
discussions on foreign policy in the session of 
that year were of peculiar excellence. There 
were three great debates which had almost ex- 
clusive reference to Eussia. On the 19th of 
February, Lord Dudley Stuart brought forward 
the whole question of Russian policy, and in 
a speech of great merit, traced the steady 
and almost unresisted progress of the great 
Northern Power, as it had gone on for years 
extending its territories, and establishing its . 
blighting influence over the rest of the world. \ 
Sir Stratford Canning introduced the affairs of 
Cracow to the attention of the House. He showed 
that in the recent occupation of that town by 
Austria, Prussia, and Russia, the Treaty of 
Vienna had been glaringly violated, and that in 
not communicating to England, as one of the 

p 



210 FOEEIGN POLICY. 

contracting parties at the Congress of Vienna, 
the long premeditated plan of triumphing over 
the independence of this last remnant of Poland, 
this country had been treated with studied dis- 
courtesy. Mr. P. M. Stewart also did his part 
in rousing the public from their lethargy, by 
explaining the peculiar relation of Turkey to 
Russia, and illustrating by numerous examples 
the important commercial interests which were 
threatened by the uncontrolled authority the 
Emperor Nicholas had now acquired on the 
Danube, and on the shores of the Black Sea. 

Gentlemen of every party spoke on these great 
questions ; but if in many of the orations there 
was much patriotism, there was little wis- 
dom. Lord Palmerston was freely censured; 
and yet war was earnestly deprecated. What 
then could the Minister do ? Not, surely, as 
some members advised him, menace, and yet 
shrink from carrying his menaces into effect. 
Sir Robert Peel, in a powerful and comprehensive 
speech, exposed with scorn and indignation the 
unworthiness of such a policy. His arguments 
were unanswerable. He said, most conclusively, 
that we could not go to war for generalities. If 
we had been injured, it was necessary to specify 
the injury, and prove that redress had been 
refused. If any particular treaty had been vio- 



DISCUSSIONS IN 1836. 211 

lated, it was necessary to specify that treaty, and 
prove that the honour of the nation had been 
outraged. The House could not then limit itself 
to a general resolution, declaring that it was the 
duty of the Government to protect the commerce 
and the political interests of the country in 
certain quarters of the globe. Much more than 
this, or nothing at all, ought to be dene. If the 
representatives of the people thought that the 
Sovereign had been injured, it was their duty 
at once to go to the foot of the throne, and 
assure His Majesty that they were ready to sup- 
port him in every measure which might be 
deemed necessary for the defence of his just 
power and influence throughout the world. 

Lord Palmerston's replies in their substance 
did not differ from what Sir Robert Peel 
expressed. But he was of course in another 
position ; he had at once to give conciliatory 
answers to the members who had made the 
motions, and also to say nothing at which 
Foreign Powers could take offence. In answer 
to Lord Dudley Stuart, he admitted that the 
power of Russia was very great, and that her 
territories were still extending ; but then, he 
said, her principal acquisitions had been made 
while the other states of Europe were involved 
in war, and that therefore the best method of 

p 2 



212 FOREIGN POLICY. 

resisting Russia was to preserve peace. He 
agreed with Sir Stratford Canning that there 
was no excuse for the Northern Courts occupy- 
ing Cracow, which in the treaty of Vienna had 
been solemnly declared to be "for ever" a free 
city. They might have been justified in requir- 
ing the removal of any turbulent refugees ; but 
not in thus, on the least delay in complying 
with their demands, pouring soldiers into a 
town which the treaty of Vienna stipulated 
that foreign troops should on no account enter. 
He also agreed with Sir Stratford Canning, that 
in not giving the least notice to the English 
Ministry of what was contemplated, an un- 
friendly spirit was indicated ; but it was at the 
same time an involuntary testimony to the 
justice of our Government, which they knew 
would never sanction such proceedings. He 
enunciated also the great principle that it was 
not by the relative importance of a state and its 
ability to resist aggression, that the right or 
wrong of such assaults on its independence 
should be judged ; and Lord Palmerston was 
unquestionably justified, according to every law, 
moral, political, and international, in maintain- 
ing that Cracow had as much right as Prussia or 
any other great Power, to have its frontier re- 
spected. But, unfortunately, the spirit of the 



discussions in 1836. 213 

treaties of Vienna was different. Unfortunately, 
it was taken for granted in the memorable Con- 
gress, that whatever the Great Powers thought 
fit to do, the small states had no business to op- 
pose ; that the declared will of Kussia, Prussia 
and Austria was sufficient to bear down everv 
fence of law, and justice, and truth, and right. 

The Foreign Secretary heartily acquiesced in 
all that Mr. Stewart had said on the import- 
ance of the commercial intercourse of England 
with Turkey. That trade had prodigiously in- 
creased even in times of war and disorder. It 
was necessary that the Government of England 
should keep a watchful eye upon Turkey, and be 
ready in her hour of need to render her as- 
sistance. But the Minister treated with dis- 
dain the insinuations that the Government had 
any dread of the power of Eussia, or was 
disposed to submit to any insults which she 
might think fit to offer. On this important 
question the language of Lord Palmerston was 
unequivocal. He professed an earnest desire 
to keep the peace ; but, notwithstanding all his 
pacific professions, one important reservation 
lurked behind, which was only the more obvious 
for not being ostentatious. Nothing could be 
more admirable than the manner in which Lord 
Palmerston at this time declared his adherence to 

p 3 



214 FOREIGN POLICY. 

a pacific policy, and at the same time expressed his 
firm determination to submit to no wrong from 
any Power whatever. He could never be misun- 
stood. Nor, as the decided attitude which he 
held for so many years, and the dread with which 
he was regarded on the Continent, proves, was 
he ever misunderstood. When speaking on 
questions of Foreign Policy, he knew what to say 
and what to avoid saying ; how to join courteous 
language with energetic action ; how to make a 
few sentences delivered in the House of Com- 
mons reverberate in the ears of the proudest 
and haughtiest of the absolute Sovereigns, with 
more salutary effect than all the elaborate de- 
spatches of the ablest diplomatists could produce. 
He thus hit between wind and water. He kept 
at bay the wild and rapacious bear of the North, 
that was ever watching the moment to clutch its 
victim. 

Lord Palmerston denied the correctness of 
the statement which Lord Dudley Stuart made 
of the manner in which the Earl of Durham was 
conveyed to Odessa, and of the entrance of the 
Black Sea having been refused to the English 
ships of war. On this point there has been much 
discrepancy ; it was of course the interest, and 
even the duty of the minister to interpret the 
actions of Eussia at that time as favourably as 



CRACOW. 215 

possible ; since it was understood that there had 
arisen no absolute necessity for war, and mem- 
bers of all parties wished to preserve peace. 
But it may easily be believed that the real facts 
were nearly as they have been stated. They 
have never been proved to be false ; and Lord 
Palmerston in many important points, even 
while questioning, really confirmed, much of 
what had been alleged. He acknowledged 
that the vessel was not "heavily armed." He 
acknowledged that the governor of Odessa had 
not saluted it because he mistook it for an 
unarmed vessel. There was then no material 
difference in the two statements ; and when 
allowance is made for the diplomatic varnish 
which all the parties concerned, Turks, Russians, 
and English, were interested in putting upon 
these transactions, there can be little doubt 
which account is the nearer the truth. 

The hostile spirit which such acts as these 
plainly demonstrate was still more openly dis- 
played during this eventful year. Lord Pal- 
merston, in the course of the discussion on 
Cracow, had pledged himself to send a consul 
to that town. The Russian and Prussian 
bayonets had retired, but the Austrian troops 
still remained. It was soon intimated that no 
English consul would be permitted to reside in 

p 4 



216 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Cracow by the lords and masters of that unfor- 
tunate state, whose freedom they had guaranteed 
for all time. This affront England had also to 
submit to, and thus were the treaties of Vienna 
thrown in the face of the English Minister. 

Still the maintenance of peace was the order 
of the day. There were indeed some impetuous 
gentlemen who were so eager for a rupture 
with Russia that they resolved if the Emperor 
would not afford England a good cause for war, 
they would make one. In the pages of the 
Portfolio some eloquent articles had appeared 
showing the importance of the commerce of 
Circassia to England, the bravery of that people, 
and the injustice of the war which Russia had 
for some time been waging about the Caucasus. 
The right of Russia to the coast below the river 
Kouban was based on the Treaty of Adrianople, 
but was by no means clear and indisputable. 
The Circassians too, although they had nomi- 
nally acknowledged the Sultan as their master, 
were far from admitting that he had the power 
to dispose of them without their consent, and 
hand them over to their hated foe. The brave 
warriors of the Caucasus were not inclined to 
acquiesce in the sentiments of smiling diplo- 
matists ; they thought that nations could not be 
transferred from one owner to another, after the 



MR. BELL AND CIRCASSIA. 217 

fashion of the statesmen of Vienna and St. 
Petersburg, like so many head of cattle. Follow- 
ing the natural impulse of their unsophisticated 
hearts and understandings, they trusted to their 
good swords; nor have they trusted in vain. 
A blockade had been established by Russia 
along the coast, and its existence commu- 
nicated through the ambassador at Constan- 
tinople to the British Government ; but as the 
ministers, without positively denying, did not 
think fit to recognise the justice of the claim 
which the Emperor was enforcing, the blockade 
had never been notified in the Gazette. 

This passive resistance did not satisfy the 
inspirer of the Portfolio, and the small circle of 
which he was the centre. Lord Palmerston was 
against his will to be driven into a war. A 
certain back-stair influence was brought into 
play ; confidential communications were held 
with Sir Herbert Taylor, the King's private 
secretary ; hints were given ; some obscure 
officials, who were supposed to know the opinions 
of their chiefs, looked mysterious ; and Mr. Bell, 
a merchant, was inspired with the design of 
sending a cargo of salt to Circassia, and of thus 
bringing the question to an issue. That the 
Secretary of State might incautiously counte- 
nance his speculation, he first entered into a 



218 FOREIGN POLICY. 

correspondence with Lord Palmerston. But 
the Minister was on his guard, and was fully 
resolved to have nothing to do with this 
officious attempt to bring about a catastrophe. 
Mr. Bell was informed that he must judge for 
himself, that Lord Palmerston could not give 
advice to any merchant on a private commercial 
enterprise, that for all recognitions of blockades, 
the Government must refer him to the Gazette. 
Mr. Bell eagerly desired the Government to 
authorise his commercial and political designs ; 
Lord Palmerston cautiously abstained from giv- 
ing him the least encouragement. Trusting, 
however, to the promptings of what he vaguely 
termed the Foreign Office, though contrary to 
the obvious meaning of the letters of the Foreign 
Secretary, Mr. Bell, like the enterprising and 
patriotic merchant that he was, set out for 
Constantinople. There the regulations of 1831 
and 1836 were shown to him by no less a person 
than the English ambassador. The risk to be 
incurred was now plain. Mr. Bell hesitated, 
and thought of abandoning his cherished project 
of giving the Circassians the opportunity of 
purchasing his excellent cargo of salt, whatever 
the fiscal regulations of Russia and the stringent 
law of blockade might say to the contrary. The 
Secretary of the Embassy was excited ; he felt 



MR. BELL AND CIRCASSIA. 219 

that the great moment of his life was now drawing 
near. He advised Mr. Bell to proceed, notwith- 
standing the language of Lord Palmerston and 
Lord Ponsonby. Was not the private secretary 
of the King more powerful than the Secretary 
of State ? So thought Mr. Urquhart, and in full 
reliance on his wisdom, the Vixen entered the 
Black Sea, and at last let go her anchor in the 
bay of Soudjouk Kale. No time was lost in 
informing the natives of the saline comforts 
with which the sloop was freighted. But before 
anything could be done, down came a Russian 
brig-of-war ; the Vixen was seized, carried igno- 
miniously into Sebastopol and confiscated as a 
contraband trader. It seemed as though Mr. 
Bell had determined to make the capture and 
loss of his vessel doubly sure. He was not 
satisfied with breaking the blockade ; he was 
not content with sending a cargo of an article 
which Russia had prohibited from being im- 
ported into Circassia at all ; but his vessel also 
entered a port which lawful trading ships were 
forbidden to approach. 

Mr. Bell called on the English Government 
for vengeance; full reparation at least he ex- 
pected to receive. He implored the assistance 
of the House of Commons. But whatever 
might have been the justice or the injustice of 






220 FOREIGN POLICY. 

the proceedings of Russia in Circassia, Lord 
Palmerston felt that he must either acquiesce in 
the legality of the confiscation, or go to war in 
vindication of Mr. Bell and his sloop Yixen. 
The pacific alternative was preferred; Mr. Bell 
was ruined*; and his name appeared in the 
Gazette, where he complained that the notifica- 
tion of the Russian blockade had never been. 
His history illustrates the danger which an 
English merchant must expect to incur when he 
will become a politician, and attempt to solve 
experimentally grave problems of international 
law. 

But the name of Mr. Bell and of his ship 
would long ago have been forgotten, had they 
not been associated with the fall of the inge- 
nious Secretary of the Embassy at Constanti- 
nople, who was unquestionably the prime mover 
in the business. A man of genius may be 
known by his works. The plan of the voyage 
of the Vixen has altogether the impress of Mr. 
Urquhart's mind. He has never denied that he 
did persuade Mr. Bell to proceed, after Lord 
Ponsonby had advised him not to go. He has 
never been able to prove that Lord Palmerston 
directly or indirectly sanctioned the expedition. 
In thus encouraging a merchant to take a 
course which might involve the country in 



MR. URQUHART. 221 

serious difficulties^ he had been guilty of a gross 
breach of official duty. Mr. Urquhart was 
Secretary of the Embassy ; and it is the business 
of a diplomatist to endeavour to maintain peace ; 
but the course which he prompted Mr. Bell to 
pursue might easily have produced war. For 
such conduct there could be no excuse. If 
every English diplomatist in every part of the 
globe were thus to act on his own individual 
opinions, without the direction of the Secretary 
of State for Foreign Affairs, and rashly en- 
courage proceedings for trying disputed ques- 
tions, it is obvious that there never would 
be a single year of peace. Lord Palmerston 
could only take one step. Mr. Urquhart had 
applied for leave of absence ; he was informed 
that he could not be permitted to return to his 
post ; but the minister kindly assured him that 
he would keep the reason of his dismissal a 
secret even from the ambassador at Constan- 
tinople. 

This consideration for his feelings did not 
satisfy Mr. Urquhart. Trusting to private in- 
fluence, relying on the friendship of Sir Herbert 
Taylor, and on the remembrances of kindness 
in the highest quarter, he had proudly ventured 
to brave the impotent displeasure of the Foreign 
Secretary. But he found, to his dismay, that 



222 FOREIGN POLICY. 

the Secretary of State, as the responsible servant 
of the Crown, was not the contemptible automa- 
ton that he had supposed him to be. Mr. 
Urquhart was dismissed ; but he has never been 
able to consider calmly the reason of his disgrace. 
He imagined that he had fallen a victim to his 
honest and uncompromising patriotism. Dark 
suspicions entered his mind. He had long been 
a marked man for his opposition to Russian in- 
trigues. His ruin had been resolved upon ; and 
though holding the seals of the Foreign Office 
of England, he was convinced that the English 
minister was a Russian agent. 

With the restless energy of a man labouring 
under one idea, and stimulated by the goads of 
wounded vanity and disappointed ambition, Mr. 
Urquhart from that moment became the re- 
lentless enemy of Lord Palmerston. He de- 
nounced the wickedness of the minister in 
market-places. Pamphlet after pamphlet and 
article after article came forth in the same spirit 
from the press. Paid lecturers traversed Eng- 
land from one end to the other, all declaiming 
on the crimes of the Foreign Secretary, who had 
sacrificed the best interests of the country in 
the person of Mr. Urquhart. The dismissed 
Secretary of Embassy saw the hand of Russia in 
everything. Whatever Lord Palmerston did, 



MR. URQUHART. 223 

and whatever he left undone, was, in Mr. Urqu- 
hart's opinion, the result of his appalling trea- 
chery. 

In justice to Mr. Urquhart it must be allowed 
that he had carefully studied the Turkish ques- 
tion. At a time when most diplomatists, and 
even statesmen, were following the old policy of 
routine, and loudly professing their confidence 
in the Emperor Nicholas, he saw the importance 
of the dominions of the Sultan, and the direction 
in which Russia was sinuously advancing. The 
first draft of the commercial treaty between 
England and the Porte was drawn up by him, 
and Lord Palmerston has readily given him the 
credit which was his due. Had the knowledge 
which he possessed of the political and commer- 
cial relations of the East been guided by sound 
judgment, he might have done his country 
inestimable service. From the imprudent man- 
ner in which he enforced his views, his expe- 
rience and information were detrimental to the 
cause he wished to support. By rushing wildly 
into extremes, by indulging in exaggeration 
when even the plain truth seemed hyperbolical 
to those who had not mastered the subject, he 
imparted an air of ridicule to the whole question, 
and actually prevented the public mind from 
giving it the earnest consideration which it might 



224 FOREIGN POLICY. 

otherwise have done. The absolute necessity of 
resisting Eussia, and of defending Turkey, is 
now generally admitted ; but it ought not to be 
forgotten that Mr. Urquhart was long an object 
of derision for pertinaciously pronouncing the 
same opinions. What, when he first spoke of it, 
appeared to his astonished listeners as a mon- 
strous paradox, is now a simple truism. Shame- 
ful as has been the rancour which Mr. Urquhart 
has exhibited towards Lord Palmerston, this 
statesman has never stooped to depreciate the 
considerable attainments of his virulent adver- 
sary, who has suffered the common fate of those 
who have the misfortune to be right at the 
wrong time, and who, though they may be sin- 
cere and upright in their general principles, 
when their own personal interests and passions 
are concerned, mistake private malevolence for 
public spirit. 

Mr. Urquhart has been unquestionably correct 
in arguing, as he has always done, that through- 
out this long period Eussia has contemplated the 
certainty of a war with England. That peace 
remained undisturbed for so many years was not 
owing, as it has sometimes been stated, to the 
wisdom of the Emperor of Eussia, but to the 
singular prudence and forbearance of our states- 
men. The energy of Nicholas was perpetually 



Russia's preparations for war. 225 

directed to those objects which he knew might 
at length make him dispute the naval supremacy 
of England. The state of the Continent afforded 
him the pretext for keeping up that immense 
display of military force which excited the ap- 
prehensions of Europe. But it was no dread of 
revolutionists and republicans, it was no jea- 
lousy of the power of France and Austria, that 
made the Emperor of Russia labour incessantly 
to organise powerful fleets, both in the Baltic 
and the Black Seas, and exhaust all the resources 
of science and art in building fortresses which 
he felt proudly confident would be impregnable. 
This was for the purpose of opposing England, 
and England alone. It was for this that his 
fleets paraded in the Baltic. It was for this 
that naval reviews were the most cherished 
amusements of the restless potentate. It was 
for this that cannon bristled at Cronstadt and 
Sebastopol, and that fortification after fortifica- 
tion was rapidly being raised.* 

To such an extent had these armaments been 
carried, that they had for some years been the 

* " Although," wrote Pozzo di Borgo to Nesselrode in 
1828, "there is no probability of seeing an English fleet in 
the Black Sea, it would be prudent to fortify Sebastopol well 
against all approaches by sea. If ever England should 
break with us, against this point will her attacks be directed 
if she believe it attackable." — Dispatch, 28th November. 

Q 



226 FOREIGN POLICY. 

cause of anxiety to the British Government. 
Lord Palmerston had to ask for explanations. 
It was a subject on which William the Fourth 
himself felt strongly. After the violent speech 
at Warsaw in the October of 1835, there could 
be no doubt that the passion and arrogance 
which the Czar then showed himself to possess, 
would some day endanger the peace and security 
of the civilised world. The King of England 
felt that it was not for him to submit to such 
menaces. He went even beyond his Ministers. 
As a sailor, he could judge of the rapidly in- 
creasing naval strength of Russia, and he knew 
that all these mighty preparations were covertly 
intended to dispute the maritime ascendancy of 
England. To the last day of his life this rivalry 
occupied his mind. He cordially approved of 
Lord Palmerston's policy in Belgium, Portugal, 
and Spain, because he thought that every effort 
to establish a free constitution must directly 
frustrate the plans of Russia. William the 
Fourth had many deficiencies ; he was not a 
great man; but he had the sentiments of an 
English King. 

The regrets of his people followed him to the 
grave. In the few years he had filled the throne, 
much had been done for justice, freedom, and 
civilisation. Nor was the work of the Foreign 



ENGLAND UNDER WILLIAM IV. 227 

Secretary of the Reform Ministry, during his six 
years of office, such as future generations will 
blush to remember. The Holy Alliance had 
been left far behind ; its palsying influence had 
been shaken off for ever. England had gone on 
her own way, trusting in that future in which 
the great men of former times believed ; that 
glorious future which, in spite of the indifference 
and contempt of their less gifted countrymen, a 
Shakespeare, a Raleigh, a Bacon, and a Milton 
saw, even "as an eagle mewing her mighty 
youth ; " that future to which Elizabeth appealed 
when she defied the civil and religious tyrant of 
her age. 



q 2 



228 



CHAP. VIII. 

COMMERCIAL TREATIES OF THE WHIG ADMINISTRATIONS. 

TREATIES WITH AUSTRIA AND TURKEY IN 1838. 

STATE OF THE EAST. — SULTAN MAHMOUD THE SECOND 

AND MEHEMET ALL LORD PALMERSTON ? S POLICY IN SYRIA 

AND EGYPT. TREATY OF THE 13TH OF JULY, 1841. 

POSITION OF LORD PALMERSTON ON THE RETIREMENT OF 
THE MELBOURNE MINISTRY. 

And now another maiden ascended the English 
throne. Ai the age of eighteen Victoria found 
herself the mistress of a realm greater, nobler, 
and fairer than any princess in ancient or 
modern times had ever inherited. She was at 
the head of the civilisation and the freedom of 
the world. All that Elizabeth and her warriors 
and statesmen had ventured to hope, all that 
her great poet had imagined, was now a mighty 
reality. There was no land in which the British 
language was not spoken ; there was no sea on 
which the British flag was not respected ; there 
were no people fighting for their liberties by 
whom the British Constitution was not admired. 
The young sovereign might well marvel at the 



COMMERCIAL TREATIES OF THE WHIGS. 229 

splendour of her inheritance, and tremble at her 
responsibilities. She might well ask for the 
support of The Being who raises and destroys 
empires, who makes and unmakes kingdoms, 
and who sets up and pulls down the diademed 
minions of the earth. 

The liberal governments of Spain and Portugal 
still existed, after a certain fashion. Queen 
Yictoria, in her days of sanguine hope and gene- 
rous enthusiasm, might earnestly wish for the 
success of Isabella and Donna Maria. In Por- 
tugal, however, after all the services that 
Englishmen had rendered, our countrymen were 
very unpopular. In Spain, after so many 
exploits of the British Legion, some of its recent 
efforts had been disastrous. The civil war still 
continued ; but the British auxiliary force, at 
the hour of their sovereign's accession, was just 
being dissolved. 

Lord Palmerston had a difficult task to 
perform. It was in vain that he endeavoured 
to apologise for the bad success of his exertions 
to tranquillise Spain. It was in vain that he 
appealed to those great principles of constitu- 
tional government which were so justly dear to 
his friends. His Spanish policy was vehemently 
attacked, and it must be confessed that there was 
much plausibility in some of the objections which 

Q 3 



230 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Sir Robert Peel and his followers made. So 
far, it ha4 certainly been unfortunate; and all 
who judged by the event were furious against 
the Minister. Yet any other course might have 
been quite as severely criticised, and perhaps 
with quite as much reason. 

Lord Palmerston suffered much in popu- 
larity. Even the English Liberals scarcely sym- 
pathised with him ; he was not considered a 
very earnest reformer. His great abilities were 
not yet acknowledged ; he was not ranked among 
statesmen ; he was at best thought a good man 
of business, combining pleasantry and jocularity 
with a certain steady paced industry. He was 
a mark for the scurrility of all the opponents of 
the Whig government. Even Sydney Smith, 
the great wit of the reformers, in the letters 
to Archdeacon Singleton, which amused all 
England, joined the assailants of the Ministry in 
disparaging the Foreign Secretary. He was 
called by opprobious names ; he was constantly 
derided by some of the most powerful organs of 
the press. Of all the members of the Whig 
cabinet, perhaps Lord Palmerston was the most 
generally abused in the first year of her present 
Majesty's reign. Yet few of them were less 
retiring, or less directly responsible for some of 
those serious mistakes which weakened and 



COMMEKCIAL POLICY. 231 

divided the popular party. Credit was not 
given to him for the measures in which he had 
been undoubtedly successful. He justly pointed 
to Belgium as the result of his energetic diplo- 
macy. He was met by a laugh and a retort 
that he had composed seventy protocols on the 
subject. Yet, so delicate was the question then 
agitated, so many conflicting interests were 
involved in it, so nearly was all Europe on the 
threshold of war before it was finally decided, 
and so much was the pacific settlement at last 
brought about due to Lord Palmerston, that 
had not his assailants been blinded by party 
spirit, they must have seen that as long as the 
Minister succeeded in maintaining peace, it was 
no reproach to him that he had drawn up 
many protocols, even though he had written not 
seventy only, but seventy times seven. In fact 
Lord Palmerston succeeded in this and in other 
threatening negotiations because of that same 
restless activity which was imputed to him as a 
fault. So harassing were the obstacles he 
everywhere met with, and so perplexing the 
jealousies of rival sovereigns, that a less deter- 
mined man would long before have given up in 
despair his efforts at conciliation, and allowed 
matters to take that course towards which they 
seemed irresistibly tending. 

Q 4 



232 FOREIGN POLICY. 

The admirable patience and activity of the 
Foreign Secretary were never more thoroughly 
exercised than in his attempts to induce foreign 
governments to consent to commercial treaties on 
the simple and honest principle of reciprocity. 
Lord Palmerston's commercial treaties are a 
peculiar feature of his ministerial career. They 
have been much misunderstood, and most ab- 
surdly misrepresented ; and because he was not 
in every instance successful they have been 
ridiculed, like most of his arduous endeavours 
to increase the power and influence of his 
country. The mere mention of a commercial 
treaty has excited in some minds a sensation of 
horror. It is at once associated with a series of 
endless and wearisome negotiations which are 
sure to have no useful result. Nor is this pre- 
judice altogether destitute of some appearance 
of reason. Difficult and almost hopeless it was 
to get many foreign governments to admit that 
the world was wide enough for them all, and 
that free commercial intercourse would ulti- 
mately benefit all nations as much as England. 
From the year in which peace was established 
by the downfal of Buonaparte, our generous allies 
showed their gratitude to England, who had 
subsidised them so largely, by carrying on a new 
and extraordinary war. Brigades of custom- 



LORD PALMERSTON's COMMERCIAL POLICY. 233 

house officers now sprang up in grim hostility 
to the produce and manufactures of this country. 
Wherever the British merchant went, he was 
met by a fiscal blockade. An English ship of 
war might have much more easily destroyed a 
hostile fortress, than all the commercial marine 
have traded advantageously where the custom- 
houses in a continental port had been established. 
Kussia, Austria, Prussia, and France might 
have subjects of dissension among themselves ; 
but on the propriety of excluding the produce 
of England they were unanimous, and they 
waged a common war. 

Lord Aberdeen, during the administration of 
the Duke of Wellington, had striven to persuade 
those who represented themselves as friendly 
governments, to adopt a better system. Nor 
had he been altogether unsuccessful. In some 
instances the rigid code had been relaxed ; 
several commercial treaties had been agreed to ; 
and in these negotiations, as in others of a 
different kind, Lord Palmerston only proceeded 
on the course which his predecessor had begun. 
But he laboured at this work earnestly and 
indefatigably. Again and again rebuffed, again 
and again he renewed his efforts. The Duke of 
Wellington in the lines of Torres Yedras 
scarcely displayed calmer resolution and more 






234 . FOREIGN POLICY. 

unshaken energy than Lord Palmerston in his 
war against the prohibitive customs duties of 
the Continent. He also had his Mr. Perceval. 
More than one President of the Board of Trade 
seriously talked of resigning his office in disgust 
rather than continue longer what he regarded 
as a fruitless and interminable contest. This 
fight for free trade or commercial reciprocity 
was indeed a hard one ; for it is much easier to 
gain a victory by force of arms than prevail on 
subjects, ministers, governments, and sovereigns 
to rise superior to their vulgar prejudices and 
frankly acknowledge their errors. 

The two most important of the fourteen com- 
mercial treaties negotiated while Lord Palmer- 
ston was the Foreign Secretary of the adminis- 
trations of Earl Grey and Lord Melbourne, were 
those with Austria and Turkey, concluded in the 
year after Her Majesty became Queen of England. 
Their effects were not merely commercial ; 
they had important political consequences. The 
position of Turkey must ever be greatly affected 
by the relations in which England and Austria 
may at any time stand towards each other. 
The treaty with Austria, therefore, greatly 
concerned Turkey, as the treaty with Turkey 
greatly concerned Austria. Lord Aberdeen, in 
1829, settled a commercial convention with 









COMMERCIAL TREATY WITH AUSTRIA. 235 

Austria, which, to a limited extent, carried out 
the principle of reciprocity. But it was only 
to endure ten years. As the time when it 
would expire drew near, Lord Palmerston had 
of course to provide for such a contingency. 
The commercial treaty of 1838 was on the same 
principle as the convention of 1829, but of 
much wider application, in a still more liberal 
spirit, and of a much more permanent nature. 

The obvious effect of the fourth article of 
this treaty, by which it is stipulated that the 
merchant ships of both nations shall freely 
navigate the Danube throughout its whole 
course, was evidently of the most vital impor- 
tance. Its tendency was to counteract the 
control over that river which, by a " fraudulent" 
interpretation of the treaty of Aclrianople, and 
by every kind of false representations and artful 
manoeuvres, Russia had succeeded in establish- 
ing. In the just and vigorous execution of 
this article, the political independence of Austria 
and her commercial prosperity were deeply 
interested. Every industrious mechanic in the 
dominions of that empire saw the necessity and 
the value of this treaty. The news of its 
ratification was received with joy. Prince 
Metternich was loudly cheered when he appeared 
on the exchange of Trieste; in Hungary, and 



236 FOREIGN POLICY. 

wherever a wish existed to oppose the baneful 
influence of Russia, it was felt that a great 
success had been achieved. 

The commercial treaty with Turkey was a 
gigantic step in the same direction, and was 
even still mightier in its results. It was justly 
regarded as another triumph over Russia. 
Throughout Europe it was said that the diplo- 
matists of Nicholas had received a check even 
in their chosen field of conflict, and where they 
thought themselves assured of their triumph. 
From the treaty of Unkiar Skelessi to 1838, 
the Sultan could scarcely be considered his own 
master. But he now once more resumed his 
independence. The struggle in the Divan 
between England and Russia was known to all 
the world, and the unscrupulous agents of 
Nicholas were successfully encountered by the 
plain, manly, and frank diplomacy of the English 
statesman. 

Examined by the abstract principles of poli- 
tical economy, this commercial treaty will be 
found far from satisfactory. It has many short 
comings ; it has some absurd stipulations ; it is 
certainly not a perfect specimen of what a com- 
mercial treaty, according to the doctrines of free 
trade, ought to be. But if some of the terms of 
the treaty are hard, they are not harder to the 






COMMERCIAL TREATY WITH TURKEY. 237 

British merchant than to the subjects of the 
Sultan. It is agreed that England shall enjoy 
all the advantages of the most favoured nation ; 
that British goods shall pay three per cent, 
import duty, with an additional duty of two per 
cent, on their transport and sale ; that the Porte 
may levy an export duty of three per cent. ; and 
that instead of the interior duties, which were 
such a serious hindrance to the diffusion of our 
manufactures in the Turkish dominions, a 
certain fixed impost shall be levied. Such were 
the leading provisions of the treaty. It, however, 
recorded the readiness of the Sultan to settle 
the commercial affairs of other nations on a 
similar foundation ; and its whole spirit was in 
effect to break the strong chain of monopoly 
which Russia had so long been forging, link by 
link, round the Turkish Empire. 

This was the great object of the negotiation ; 
and to this the mere commercial arrangements 
were secondary. For this it was worth while to 
make some sacrifices, and to acquiesce in some 
restrictions to which, in different circumstances, 
neither Lord Palmerston nor any other minister 
would have given their consent. In Paris, 
Vienna, and Berlin, it was admitted, even by the 
partisans of Russia, that she had been defeated 






238 FOREIGN POLICY. 

by England ; and other governments began to 
rouse themselves from their apathy. 

But Mr. Urquhart, who now saw his labours 
completed by another person, did not join in the 
shout of triumph which was echoed over Europe. 
He declared, in no equivocal language, his sus- 
picions of Lord Palmerston's duplicity. He 
eagerly perused the treaty when it was given to 
the public. Some of the articles were different 
from those of the original draft ; some of them 
were not so beneficial to England as his pro- 
jected articles. He felt for his masterpiece of 
commercial wisdom that love which a father 
feels for his child, or a poet for the creation of 
his genius. He was indignant that there 
should have been any alterations, omissions, or 
additions. He thought his work ought to have 
been ratified precisely as it had been originally 
planned. He believed that it was not the 
business of a negotiator to accept the best terms 
that he could obtain, but the best that could 
possibly be imagined. Smarting from his re- 
cent humiliation, and full of his suspicions of 
treachery, he was now convinced that the whole 
treaty was a mere deception, that the paw of 
the great bear could be discerned in it, and that 
all England, and all the merchants and statesmen 



MR. UEQUHART. 239 

of Europe, were deceived when they applauded 
it as a victory over the Imperial Dictator. 

Had the commercial advantages of the treaty 
been as illusory as Mr. Urquhart supposed, it 
would not follow that England had gained 
nothing by that negotiation. It is certain that 
Russia stood aloof, and refused her adhesion. 
It is certain that all the other Powers ap- 
proved of it, and hastened to joined England. 
It is certain that some years later Russia 
thought fit to follow the example of this country, 
and thus tacitly admitted the justice and the 
utility of the treaty. It is certain, too, that 
Lord Palmer ston's success was universally be- 
lieved in by the most experienced politicians; 
and in political affairs even the mere opinion of 
success is almost as important as the reality. 
The fiction grows into a fact ; and among 
nations gives that weight and influence which 
the clearest statistical tables sometimes fail to 
command. 

This was eminently so in 1838. If this 
success was imaginary, its consequences were 
certainly not imaginary. The word " Palmer- 
ston " became a great one in Europe ; it became 
a talisman which has not yet lost its magical 
virtue. Never, since the days of Chatham, did 
the simple name of an English statesman carry 
with it such power : it was a power of which 



240 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Englishmen may be honestly proud, for it did 
not depend on armed battalions nor on the 
mere physical force of an empire ; it was a 
power essentially moral ; a power founded on 
opinion ; a power in which the public spirit 
of England was embodied, disciplined, and 
arrayed against that unscrupulous and vain- 
glorious despotism which, like a black cloud at 
first no bigger than a man's hand, after having 
gradually spread over the whole northern 
and eastern horizon, now impended over the 
West, depressing the hearts of all lovers of true 
freedom, and darkening the face of nature. 

It was well for the world that Lord Palmer- 
ston had attained a great position and acquired 
a reputation for courage, energy, and determina- 
tion. The state of the East soon required the 
complete exercise of these masculine qualities. 

Mehemet Ali had never abandoned his design 
of rendering himself a great potentate indepen- 
dent of the Sultan, and recognised by Europe. 
The dread of his intentions, and the hope of 
succour from England, were the motives 
which led the more enlightened of the Turkish 
ministers to consent to the commercial treaty. 
Already the Pasha of Egypt had refused to pay 
his annual tribute to the Porte. Already his 
great military and naval preparations had 
excited the apprehensions of the Sultan, and the 



MAHMOUD II. AND MEHEMET ALL 241 

attention of every statesman. Already he 
had even taken upon himself the sacred rights 
of the Sultan as caliph and chief of Islam, 
and had ventured to interfere with the adminis- 
tration of the holy cities which are so deeply 
venerated by all true Mussulmans. 

Sultan Mahmoud the Second was fast hasten- 
ing to the tomb ; but feeble as he was through 
his infirmities, though his frame was torn by 
excruciating agony, and his mind still more 
tortured by the fear that the empire which he 
had so ably endeavoured to save, was on the 
brink of destruction, he resolved, with the spirit 
of his great ancestors, not to submit to the 
usurpations of his ambitious subject. In the 
spring of 1839, the Commander of the Faithful 
collected a powerful army on the banks of the 
Euphrates, and prepared to contend for the 
rights of which he was the sacred and hereditary 
guardian. A formidable force, on the other 
hand, was assembled at Aleppo under the 
command of Ibrahim Pasha. A great European 
and Asiatic crisis was drawing near. 

The catastrophe which the Ministers of France 
and England had deprecated ever since the 

O A.. 

treaty of Unkiar Skelessi had come to their 
knowledge appeared imminent. If the Sultan 

R 



242 FOREIGN POLICY. 

should be defeated, Russia would have a fair pre- 
tence for rushing to his rescue and confirming 
her influence at Constantinople. If the troops 
of Nicholas should be once more quartered at 
Scutari, it might be doubtful whether they would 
ever return. If the Russian fleet once held the 
Dardanelles, another Cronstadt, another Sebas- 
topol, might soon be erected in that important 
position, even with the permission of the Sultan, 
and under the pretext of defending him ; then 
the sure and speedy dissolution of the Turkish 
Empire would be inevitable ; and the Sultan 
become to the Emperor of Russia what the Great 
Mogul became to the East India Company. THe 
might still reside in a palace on the Bosphorus; 
he might still be surrounded by all the pomp 
and ceremonial of eastern magnificence ; treaties 
might still run in his name; but all political 
power, all real authority, must have departed 
from him; his glorious heritage must have 
passed to his ostensible protector ; and the 
dominion of Russia would only have been more 
secure, and the state of transition rendered 
more easy, by this nominal independence. I Of 
all the "modes of domination" which Lord 
Aberdeen in 1829 so sagaciously foresaw, when 
so many liberal politicians were the slaves of 
prejudice, this would unquestionably have been 



MAHMOUD II. AND MEHEMET ALL 243 

the most " irresistible." The Sultan would 
have been placed, like his predecessor Bajazet, 
in a cage, of which the Emperor of Russia 
would have kept the key. 

It was this result which all the civilised 
nations of the world had so deep a stake in 
averting. It was this result which it was the 
especial duty of Lord Palmerston to prevent. 
He had given the Porte clearly to understand 
that should Mehemet Ali boldly carry matters 
to an extremity, it might expect aid from 
England. France had been consulted, and the 
Governments of the two great Western nations 
were ostensibly united. But the French 
Ministry was in an extremely unsettled state. 
Louis Philippe would be his own prime min- 
ister ; few eminent French statesmen would 
long consent to occupy a second place in a 
government in which they were thought to be 
the chiefs ; and a succession of precarious 
administrations rapidly followed each other. 
As the King of the French was known to 
be personally favourable to the alliance with 
England, a strong party opposed to his Govern- 
ment grew dissatisfied with the system of 
foreign policy of which the connection Yv r ith 
England was the foundation. 

When the Eastern difficulty broke out, the 

R 2 



244 FOREIGN POLICY. 

action of the two Governments was apparently 
harmonious. It is true that even then a differ- 
ence of opinion might be discovered : France 
evidently regarded the Sultan as the aggressor, 
while England considered that the quarrel had 
been forced upon him by his aspiring servant. 
But this seemed of slight importance. A 
common jealousy of Russia, and a fear of the 
advantages which the Emperor might take, 
should the Sultan be by the fortune of war 
rendered helpless as in 1833, sufficed to keep 
the Western Powers together. 

The events of a few short months proved that 
the doubts which the English and French Minis- 
ters expressed of the inability of the Sultan to 
resist the aggressions of Mehemet Ali were well 
founded. The general of the Sublime Porte 
was completely defeated, and there was nothing 
to prevent Ibrahim Pasha from marching to 
Constantinople. 

Before the news of the rout of the Turkish 
army reached the Bosphorus, Sultan Mahmoud 
slept with his fathers. He retained the energy 
and determination of his character to the last. 
Amid the distractions of his empire, the rebellion 
of his dependents, and the miseries of a social 
and political revolution, with an enfeebled frame 
and a broken heart, he had displayed the 



MAHMOUD II. AND MEHEMET ALL 245 

qualities of a hero. It may be well questioned 
whether Mehemet Ali himself, whose abilities 
were so much praised, and whose star was 
rising so proudly in the East, had in all the 
vicissitudes of his life and his struggles from 
obscurity to glory shown more genuine great- 
ness, more unshaken courage, and more real 
genius than this unfortunate Sultan, who in such 
a sad hour prayed his last prayer and breathed 
his last breath. He had stood by the couch of 
a declining empire, and had not despaired. In 
defiance of the prejudices of his subjects and 
the sneers of Europeans, he had striven to revive, 
when it seemed at the last gasp, the expiring 
dominion of his house. With none to encourage, 
with none to guide him, he had made a political 
resurrection, and had given organisation to a 
state which was nothing but a mass of ruins. 
The work he had performed was far beyond the 
abilities even of the most loquacious of political 
reformers. He had struggled earnestly and 
wisely ; and had earned a new and peculiar 
kind of glory by arresting the progress of decay. 
Where all seemed prostration and death he had 
sown the seeds of energy and life ; and they 
only required time and repose to grow and 
fructify. He deserves to be regarded as one 
of the greatest of the Sultans. Mahomet, when 

R 3 



246 FOREIGN POLICY. 

he last shook the dust of Mecca from his feet, and 
first raised his standard amid the barren sands 
of Arabia, was not, apparently, engaged in a more 
hopeless cause than Mahmoud the Second when 
he resolved to make war on the corruptions, 
abuses, and prejudices of Turkey, to destroy the 
Janissaries, and to introduce the improvements 
of European civilisation into the Eastern Empire. 
In 1839 that numerous race of political phi- 
losophers who only judge of such efforts by 
their immediate success, pronounced this work 
of regeneration to be a decided failure. Lord 
Palmerston was, however, not one of them. He 
had fully adopted those ideas which he still 
holds, and argued in 1839 as in 1853, that the 
condition of Turkey was not irremediable ; that 
the signs of progress might be seen; and that 

\ with care, patience, and wisdom, the valour of 
the Mussulmans, under an enlightened adminis- 
tration, might yet constitute a formidable ram- 
part against the ambition of Russia. And on 
this principle the English statesman acted. 

Unfortunately the French Ministry had not 
the same far-sighted views. They believed that 

{ nothing could permanently save Turkey, and 
they considered Mehemet Ali the only man 
capable of successfully resisting the formidable 
northern Power. From this difference of opinion 



LORD PALMERSTON'S POLICY IN THE EAST. 247 



sprung 



many future dissensions. But other 
powerful motives were also in operation. Since 
the acquisition of Algiers, an acquisition which 
the Deputies foolishly pledged themselves, in an 
answer to an address from the Throne, on no 
account to relinquish, they thought of gaining 
an influence in the East through Mehemet Ali, 
so as effectually to oppose the influence which 
Russia possessed through the Greek subjects of 
the Porte. A protectorate was to be met by a 
protectorate, and influence was to be arrayed 
against influence. To Frenchmen Egypt had 
peculiar associations. When Napoleon was tired 
with the monotony of Europe, it was to that 
country he turned with longing eyes and lofty 
aspirations, as the spot from which a new and 
mighty empire rivalling that of Alexander 
might radiate. It was there that he was en- 
countered by the genius of England, and his 
gigantic projects crushed in the bud. From 
that time Frenchmen supposed that England 
herself had designs upon Egypt, and that her 
policy in the East was directed even by the 
mere instinct of self-preservation to this great 
object. It was in vain that our Ministers 
asserted that they did not wish for Egypt, that 
if it was offered to us we would not accept it, 
and that all we wanted in Egypt was a road. 

R 4 



248 FOREIGN POLICY. 

These professions were answered by an incre- 
dulous smile. They were classed with the 
virtuous and humble declarations of the Em- 
peror of Russia that he did not want Constan- 
tinople. The newspapers of Paris were full of 
such notions ; and surely their editors may be 
excused for entertaining them, when the great 
Autocrat, up to the present time, and not- 
withstanding all his experience of our disinte- 
restedness, had the same fixed idea. Egypt was 
the luring bribe he held out to Sir Hamilton 
Seymour, in order to induce the English Mi- 
nisters to assist him in the partition of Turkey, 
when he thought the seasonable time had come. 
The French Government may even be excused 
for despairing of the future of Turkey. Never, 
surely, was a great empire left in a more dis- 
astrous state. Abdul Medjid, a mere youth of 
seventeen, had just been seated on the totteriug 
throne of his deceased father, His army was 
disorganised. Two or three weeks after his 
accession his fleet deserted to the enemy. 
There was discord among the ministers, dis- 
content in the capital, and rebellion triumphant 
in Syria. The Russian troops and ships of war 
might at any moment appear in the Bosphorus, 
or at any moment Ibrahim Pasha might lead his 
forces to Constantinople. But one ray of hope 



LORD PALMERSTON's POLICY IN THE EAST. 249 

still beamed on that lowering horizon. The 
English fleet was in an efficient state ; the reso- 
lution of the English Minister was not doubted ; 
the English admiral menaced Alexandria, and 
English men-of-war were standing off Tenedos. 
It was known in Constantinople, and what is 
more it was also known at Alexandria, at 
Sebastopol, and at St. Petersburg, that the 
moment a Russian squadron or the Egyptian 
troops approached Constantinople, Lord Palmer- 
ston had determined to force the Dardanelles, 
and that at any cost the flag of England should 
also wave in the sea of Marmora. 

It is at such terrible conjunctures that the 
spirit of a statesman is shown. Then it is seen 
whether he has only capacity to drift on the 
current of events, or genius and courage to 
command those circumstances of which, with 
vacillation or feebleness, he must inevitably 
become the victim. And it is doing Lord 
Palmerston but scanty justice to acknowledge 
that with his colleagues trembling at the respon- 
sibilities they were sharing with him, coldly 
supported by his friends, in a minority in the 
Cabinet, and with the Government but dragging 
on its existence from day to day, he was fully 
equal to the occasion and gave no sign of 
wavering. 



250 FOREIGN POLICY. 

In council he was manfully seconded by Lord 
John Russell. But one of the Whig Ministers 
was not satisfied with a silent protest against 
his policy. Lord Holland still held his opinions 
of 1829. He still held all his prejudices against 
Turkey, and, there is reason to believe, was the 
cause of much embarrassment to the Foreign 
Secretary. He shared the sentiments of the 
French politicians with regard to Mehemet Ali, 
and gave to a French diplomatic agent private 
assurances which were widely different from all 
the public declarations of Lord Palmerston. 
Thus the French Ministers were misled, and the 
serious misunderstanding with England brought 
about. But Lord Holland died before these 
Eastern negotiations were concluded, and peace 
was fully established in the Levant. His speeches 
on the foreign policy of England should be studied 
by all who would follow the progress of opinion 
and the sentiments of parties throughout the last 
thirty years. He was an honest politician, a 
man of excellent intentions, a munificent patron 
of literature. But he scarcely deserved all the 
panegyrics which his friends have pronounced 
over his tomb, and hence their eulogies have 
been in a certain sense injurious to his fame. 
His posthumous publications have been severely 
criticised ; and when read without that personal 



loed Holland's opposition. 251 

interest wfrich they acquired from the social 
qualities of their author, do not justify the 
claims which have been made to the approbation 
of posterity. Lord Holland was proud to ac- 
knowledge himself the pupil of Mr. Fox; and 
" Mr. Fox's pupil " he might be called even 
when he was a grey-haired old man. His mind 
never expanded beyond the confines of that 
select political circle of which he was so eminent 
a member. He never did justice to Edmund 
Burke, but had the same jealousy of that great 
man which Mr. Fox's political followers felt im- 
mediately after the publication of the Reflections 
on the French Revolution, and the consequent 
disruption of the Whig party. 

Lord Holland's interference in this difference 
between Mehemet Ali and the Sultan was 
certainly pernicious. But for some time all 
promised well. (France took the initiative in 
professing a desire to preserve the integrity and 
the independence of the Ottoman Empire. She 
stopped the march of Ibrahim Pasha ; and the 
circular which was sent to her servants in the 
East by the French Government was admired 
and imitated by the other four Powers. It 
left nothing to be desired. A satisfactory 
termination to the troubles of Turkey seemed 
speedy and certain. The important note 



252 FOREIGN POLICY. 

addressed to the Porte when it was about to 
concede many of Mehemet Ali's demands, and 
which virtually placed the Sultan under the 
protection of all Europe, was believed to have 
been first suggested by France. It was cer- 
tainly a great point gained, and one on which 
the Western Powers might sincerely congratulate 
each other. It was a surrender of the exclusive 
pretensions which Russia had so long made, and 
which she had secured by treaty at Unkiar 
Skelessi. The French fleet continued to cruise 
with the English in the Mediterranean ; and the 
orders which Lord Palmerston sent to Admiral 
Stopford were previously transmitted to Paris ■ 
for the consideration of the French Government, j 
Nothing could be more straightforward than* 
the proceedings of the English Foreign Secretary. 
All that was necessary for firm union was corre- 
sponding openness and corresponding sincerity. 
Vienna was proposed as the place in which the 
plenipotentiaries of the five Powers were to deli- 
berate on the Eastern question. But Russia had at 
that time an instinctive jealousy of the interference 
of Austria in Turkey, and at length it was agreed 
that London should be the seat of this great 
European conference. Had the French Ministry 
and the French nation been in a proper mood, 
they would have seen that the fact of the metro- 



lord palmerston's POLICY IN 1839. 253 

polis of England being chosen for the Congress 
when the Western Powers were closely united, 
was another and still more decisive advantage. 
But the French Ministry and the French nation 
were bent on being unreasonable. They were 
resolved to give Russia every opportunity for 
breaking that generous alliance founded on com- 
mon interest and common freedom, which had 
for ten years excited her apprehension. 

And this was the key to the moderation which 
the Emperor Nicholas then showed. He endea- 
voured by every means to gain the confidence of 
Lord Palmerston, or, at all events, to prevent 
him from taking any measures in the East de- 
cidedly hostile to Russia. To acquire the con- 
fidence of the Foreign Secretary was indeed 
impossible ; but if the proposals of Russia were 
fair, he was surely not precluded, even by his 
alliance with France, from giving them his sup- 
port. He had shown a determined hostility to 
the schemes of Nicholas in many ways, and in 
many lands. He had taken a resolute, and even 
menacing attitude. Russia had received from 
him, even since Mehemet Ali had renewed his 
efforts for independence, one of the sharpest of 
remonstrances. There was no mistaking the 
Note of October 26th, 1838, from Lord Palmer- 
ston, to our Ambassador at St. Petersburg. It 



254 FOREIGN POLICY. 

informed the Emperor of what he might expect 
from his intrigues in Persia, and what was the 
limit to the forbearance of England. The de- 
bates in Parliament since the treaty of Unkiar 
Skelessi, had given the Minister a moral strength 
with which he could fearlessly undertake great 
things. The hour of action had arrived ; there 
was the power of a great nation, and the ability 
and courage to use it well. 

In the summer of 1839, the members of the 
Conference on Eastern Affairs assembled in Lon- 
don. Every effort was made to keep their de- 
liberations secret ; but it was soon known that 
there was a serious disagreement between France 
and the other four Powers, on the measures to 
be pursued for the support of the Sultan and 
the pacification of his dominions. The opinion 
of England had been long given, and had never 
varied. She regarded Mehemet Ali as a rebel, 
and considered his summary expulsion from 
Syria the first and essential element of a future 
peace. When he had restored the Turkish 
fleet, and evacuated the provinces he had 
wrongfully seized, then, and not until then, 
Lord Palmerston, said terms might be granted 
to him by which he could retain the hereditary 
pashalic of Egypt. The opinion of Austria was 
not widely diverse. Prince Metternich thought 



LORD palmerston's POLICY IN 1838-9. 255 

the Sultan might again become master of Syria, 
either during Mehemet Ali's life, or at his death. 
Eussia was ready to agree to either the plan of 
Austria, or that of England ; and it cannot be 
denied, that the sacrifices she made, and the 
modest and dignified tone she then used, were 
highly creditable to the prudence and discretion 
of the Emperor, and contrasted painfully with 
the impracticability of the French Government. 
France had pledged herself to maintain the in- 
tegrity and independence of the Sultan, and yet 
treated Mehemet Ali as his equal. She could 
not consent to use force against the Pasha. He 
might be persuaded to make " concessions." The 
French Ministers would use their influence over 
him for that purpose ; but still he might retain 
the hereditary possession of Syria, and wield the 
power of that province for the defence of the 
Sultan, whom he would then be able and willing 
to shield from the attacks of all his enemies. 
France looked upon Mehemet Ali as the strong 
man in the East, who might play the same part 
towards the Sultan, as the Mayors of the Palace 
had once played to the effeminate and incompe- 
tent successors of Charlemagne. 

This policy was based on two suppositions, 
both of which were wrong. It was assumed 
that Mehemet Ali's power was not a mere 



256 FOREIGN POLICY. 

anomaly, but a sound organic development 
which would continue to exist after he was in 
his grave, and that the Sultan and his Ministers, 
being incapable of conducting the administra- 
tion, required a protector of some sort to pre- 
serve their empire from falling to pieces. Now 
Mehemet Ali was an old man ; he was pro- 
verbially a merciless ruler ; he cared nothing 
for the happiness of the people he governed ; 
his dominion was simply founded on brute 
force ; it had no moral cohesion, and was not 
likely to be handed down in its strength and 
integrity to his descendants. He was hated by 
the very people of whom liberal France wished 
to make him the perpetual master ; his cruelty 
had driven them to desperation; rebellion had 
succeeded rebellion, and the Christian population 
of Syria especially shuddered at his present and 
prospective tyranny. Was it for such a person 
and for such a cause that the friendship of 
England was to be sacrificed ? The Sultan was 
certainly weak, but it was Mehemet Ali who 
had made him weak. It was Mehemet Ali who, 
in 1833, had driven the Porte to accept the pro- 
tection of Russia. It was Mehemet Ali who 
was now, by his vain and senile dreams of 
independence, jeopardising Turkey, and again 
giving the Emperor Nicholas the occasion, which 



BARON BRUNNOW's MISSION. 257 

France so much feared, of sending his fleets and 
armies to Constantinople, 

A more mistaken course of policy than that 
which the French press, and in consequence the 
French ministers, then advocated, was never 
adopted by a great nation. It alienated Eng- 
land without conciliating Eussia. It united in 
opposition those who, like Lord Palmerston, 
believed that the Turkish Empire was capable 
of regeneration under the Sultan, and those 
who, like Count Nesselrode, wished to see the 
power of the Czar firmly extended to the Dar- 
danelles. 

Weeks slipped away, and the five Powers had 
come to no decisive resolution. Every effort to 
prevail on France to act in concert with the rest 
of Europe, had failed. Lord Palmerston hadgiven 
the French ministers distinctly to understand, 
that if it was found impossible for France to 
unite with the other Powers, she was not to be 
surprised if they, at last, determined to act with- 
out her co-operation. Russia had taken pains 
to send Baron Brunnow on a special mission to 
England ; the French Government well knew that 
he had arrived in London on the 15th of Septem- 
ber, and they might have easily guessed that his 
object was to dissolve the alliance of the Western 
Powers. Common prudence might surely have 

s 



258 FOREIGN POLICY. 

suggested the necessity of no longer standing 
aloof. Common sense might have shown that 
it was not likely four great nations would sacri- 
fice their settled principles to the opinions of a 
single Power with whom they did not agree. 
But it was all vain. The statesmanship of 
France seemed spell-bound. 

The accounts written by Baron Brunnow and 
Lord Palmerston of their conversations on the 
troubles of the East in the autumn of 1839 are 
very interesting and amusing. As the impracti- 
cability of France was established, the friendly 
professions of Russia to England increased. 
Baron Brunnow was all frankness and candour. 
He expressed the gratification of the Emperor 
on finding how little difference there was in the 
opinions of England and Russia on the affairs 
of the Levant. He was happy to find that Lord 
Palmerston now appeared to have more con- 
fidence than he had formerly professed in the 
good faith of Russia. The Emperor felt that he 
deserved this confidence. He wished to give the 
fullest explanations, and his earnest desire was 
to be on the most friendly terms with England. 
On the differences between the Pasha of Egypt 
and the Porte, his Imperial Majesty could have 
but one opinion. The Sultan was a sovereign 
and an airy ; Mehemet Ali, a revolted subject. 



PROPOSALS OF RUSSIA. 259 

All that was necessary for maintaining peace 
was that Russia and England should come to a 
clear understanding. They were the " two 
governments," * and the other Powers would 
agree to what the}', when united, might 
determine. He highly approved of the coercive 
measures Lord Palmerston recommended. But 
if the coasts of Syria and Egypt were blockaded, 
and all the supplies of Ibrahim Pasha's army 
intercepted, might not he in a moment of despe- 
ration, as he had threatened, advance to the 
Bosphorus and overawe Constantinople ? Was 
it not then necessary, Baron Brunnow said, 
that Russia and England should previously 
settle what course should be taken, and be 
fully prepared for such an emergency ? The 
Emperor had a plan to propose which he had no 
doubt would be quite satisfactory and produce 
the happiest results. If England would agree to 

* In the opinion of the Emperor Nicholas, there are ever 
only two Governments in the world. Whenever he has any 
flattering overtures to make, it is his custom to inform the 
ambassador of the state he desires to conciliate that there 
are only two Governments. Sometimes one of these Govern- 
ments is England, sometimes the United States of America, 
and sometimes it is Prussia; but while the name of one of 
the Powers of which the Emperor condescends to acknow- 
ledge the existence, may vary according to circumstances, 
Russia is invariably the other, and remains, in his mind, 
the only perpetual and unchangeable Government. 

s 2 



260 FOREIGN TOLICY. 

it, Nicholas would pledge himself not to renew 
the treaty of Unkiar Skelessi, which he was 
aware had been regarded with much distrust. 
He would give assistance to the Sultan, not as 
under the obligations of that treaty, which 
however he still considered binding, but as the 
agent of the five Powers, His forces would be 
the forces of the alliance ; as the forces of the 
alliance they would move to protect Constanti- 
nople, and as the forces of the alliance, when 
that service should be performed, they would 
retire. The other Powers would not of course 
remain inactive. A convention might settle 
what work France, Austria, and England should 
respectively execute. But, as a general rule, 
whatever was necessary to be done in Syria and 
Egypt, might be done by these three Powers, 
while all the operations requisite within the 
Straits and in Asia Minor, should be performed 
by Russia. 

This was the proposition of his Imperial 
Majesty, communicated by Baron Brunnow to 
Lord Palmerston. Here was the explanation of 
the frank, candid, magnanimous, and disinterested 
professions of the Emperor of all .the Russias. 
The gist of the matter was, that whatever might 
happen, England should confine herself to the 
Mediterranean, and that within the Dardanelles 



LORD palmerston's POLICY IN 1839-40. 261 

Russia should have free scope to cement her 
power and extend her influence. It was the 
treaty of Unkiar Skelessi under another name, 
and with the difference that the Western Powers 
were to negotiate their own exclusion from the 
sea of Marmora, and permit Russia, with their 
eyes open, to be the ruler at Constantinople. 

Lord Palmerston informed Baron Brunnow that 
the Government of this country fully reciprocated 
all the friendly declarations of the Emperor. 
But the Foreign Secretary had a slight modifi- 
cation to propose in the imperial plan. It was a 
very slight one ; but if it could not be agreed to 
the English Minister would be reluctantly com- 
pelled to reject the propositions altogether. The 
moment that the Russian fleet entered the 
Bosphorus to defend the Sultan, the Dardanelles 
must also be opened, and a few English ships of 
war under their national flag also enter the waters 
of the Porte. They would not go to menace 
Russia, but merely to assert the principle that 
the Straits were not open to one European Power 
and shut to another. 

Baron Brunnow was extremely sorry that this 
was the decision of the English Government. He 
had not received instructions on that particular 
point. He must refer it to the Emperor. But 
in the mean while much valuable time might be 

s 3 



262 FOREIGN POLICY. 

lost. Could not something be decided ? Could 
not England at once undertake decisive opera- 
tions against Mehemet Ali, and leave the question 
of the Dardanelles and Bosphorus to be settled 
by a subsequent arrangement ? 

The Baron was pressing. He urged every 
argument to persuade Lord Palmerston to take 
some irrevocable step. But the minister was 
not to be deceived. Until Russia had agreed to 
allow the flag of England to appear in a certain 
part of the Sea of Marmora, should the necessity 
for such interference occur, Lord Palmerston 
would not permit himself to be inextricably in- 
volved in a series of measures on which the fate 
of Asia and of Europe depended. He was placed 
at that time in a most difficult situation. Ibrahim 
Pasha might appear with his victorious troops in 
the vicinity of Constantinople. Russia might pour 
her armies into Turkey. All this time Mehemet Ali 
was busily engaged in strengthening his position. 
The merciless conscription was actively going on ; 
new battalions were daily drilled and paraded in 
the streets of Cairo ; the united fleets of Turkey 
and Egypt were daily being made more efficient. 
Every day the necessity for immediate action 
was more imminent, yet every day the joint 
action of the five Powers, through the obstinacy 
of the French Ministers, was more hopeless. It 



LORD palmerston's POLICY IN 1839-40. 263 

seemed as though Lord Palmerston would be 
obliged to quarrel with France, and yet have 
no definite agreement with Russia. 

In the January of 1840, Baron Brunnow re- 
turned to England. He brought with him the 



&' 



consent of the Emperor to the alterations Lord 
Palmerston required in the original propositions. 
If events compelled Russia to send her armies 
and vessels to Constantinople, England and 
France might each send three line-of-battle ships 
through the Dardanelles. The firmness of the 
Foreign Secretary had prevailed. The treaty \ 
of Unkiar Skelessi was thus virtually abrogated \ 
and was not to be renewed. The concessions \ 
then made by the Emperor of Russia were not 
confined to England ; all the advantages were 
equally to be shared by France. / 

But a ministerial crisis occurred in that 
kingdom. All negotiations were suspended 
from February to May. Lord Palmerston 
hoped that the new Ministry, when it was at 
length established, would be more conciliating; 
but in that hope he was disappointed. M. 
Thiers was not more inclined to coerce Mehemet 
Ali than Marshal Soult had been. For twelve 
months negotiations had been carried on, and 
yet no agreement was concluded ; for twelve 
months France alone had prevented the action 

s 4 



264 FOREIGN POLICY. 

of the rest of Europe ; after twelve months of 
diplomacy it seemed that the five Powers were 
further from coming to a satisfactory arrange- 
ment than when the conference first met. In 
July 1839, France was the most eager for the 
common interference of Europe in the affairs of 
the East; but in July 1840, France had rejected 
every proposition which had been made to her, 
and she stood alone. 

What was to be done ? To wait for the ad- 
hesion of the French Government to the objects 
of the four Powers, would be waiting for what 
might never come. To inform M. Thiers of the 
intentions of the other courts might easily be 
construed into a menace, and would certainly 
give him an opportunity of warning Mehemet 
Ali of the designs against him, and cause the Pasha 
to be fully prepared to offer a determined resist- 
ance. The French telegraph would be imme- 
diately called into requisition, and probably the 
plan of the alliance frustrated. Contrary to the 
intentions of Lord Palmerston, some of the 
pacific projects to which France had been asked 
to agree, were sent to the Pasha of Egypt 
by the French Minister. The English states- 
man had also been informed from very different 
quarters, that the French ambassador at Con- 
stantinople was endeavouring to persuade the 



TREATY OF THE 15tH JULY, 1840. 265 

Porte to accept the terms which Mehemet AH 
had offered, independently of all communication 
with the Governments that had undertaken to 
settle the question. ""Reluctantly, but resolutely, 
Lord Palmerston came to a decision. On the 
15th of July, just within the year from the time 
when the collective note of the five Powers was 
presented to the Porte, and the war between 
Mehemet AH and the Sultan taken under the 
consideration of Europe, a Convention was signed 
between Russia, England, Prussia, and Austria, 
with the Sublime Porte, without the concurrence 
or the knowledge of France. 

By this convention the fate of Mehemet AH 
was decided. The combined Powers advised the 
Sultan to grant to the Pasha the hereditary pos- 
session of Egypt, the command for life of the 
fortress of St. Jean dAcre, with the title of 
Pasha of Acre, and the administration of the 
south of Syria. If this arrangement was not 
accepted by Mehemet AH in ten days after it 
had been communicated to him, he was only to 
be offered the Pashalic of Egypt, which if he 
did not accept before the expiration of the ten 
following days he would be offered no terms 
whatever, but have to abide the fortune of war, 
and the united strength of the European sove- 
reigns. 



266 FOREIGN FOLIC Y. 

Two days after this important document was 
signed, a memorandum was delivered to M. 
Guizot, the French ambassador in London, in- 
forming him of what had been decided, and ex- 
pressing the regret of the other Powers that 
they had been compelled to come to such a 
determination without the assent of France. 
The effect on the minds of our ardent neigh- 
bours was electric. Their pride and vanity 
were deeply wounded ; and stimulated by all 
the organs of their Government, they seemed 
almost frenzied. Just before the prorogation of 
Parliament in the autumn, Lord Palmerston in 
the House of Commons gave an explanation of 
his conduct, and laid all the blame on the French 
Ministry. He had not isolated France ; France 
had isolated herself. She would not act with 
the other Powers ; they had therefore at last 
been obliged to act without her. No effort had 
been spared to prevail on her to join with them; 
project after project, proposition after proposi- 
tion, had been made to her, but all in vain. A 
plan founded on the suggestion of General 
Sebastiani himself, the late French ambassador, 
had even been offered at last by the English 
Foreign Secretary, but that also was rejected. 
Lord Palmerston deeply regretted that he could 
not induce France to unite with the other Go- 



CONDUCT OF M. THIEKS. 267 

vernments, but after so much time had been 
lost, and when the state of the East was so pre- 
carious, he could take no other course. He had 
none but friendly feelings towards France. He 
regarded her alliance as of inestimable value. 

This speech, far from calming the irritation of 
the French people, only made them still more 
furious. It was pouring oil upon fire ; the 
flame blazed fiercer and fiercer. M. Thiers' 
conduct at that time was little creditable to his 
wisdom or his philanthrop}^ Before he was 
placed in the responsible position he then occu- 
pied, he had spoken eloquently in favour of the 
continuance of the alliance with England. He had 
even confessed that France and England had op- 
posite views on the Syrian question, but that it 
was only as the negotiations proceeded, and the 
sentiments of the two Governments were ex- 
plained, that the attachment of France toMehemet 
Ali had been disclosed. But now his vanity was 
incensed. He had prided himself on his genius for 
foreign policy ; he had supposed that he could 
oblige the English Minister to follow him in his 
course; and he had been wrong in all his calcula- 
tions. He did not think it unworthy of him as 
the head of the Government, to rouse by every 
means the passions of the multitude, and to pre- 
cipitate his country into a war with all Europe, 



268 FOREIGN POLICY. 

but especially with England. He made immense 
preparations for a great European conflict, spoke 
in the tone of a braggadocio, and thought that 
he could intimidate Lord Palmerston from carry- 
ing out the line of policy which he had pledged 
himself and his country to follow. 

Had the Foreign Secretary been a weak or hesi- 
tating minister, he might have trembled at the 
difficulties by which he was environed ; he might 
have sacrificed the interests of Turkey, and de- 
graded himself in the eyes of all Europe without 
conciliating M. Thiers and his extravagant ad- 
mirers. The French Minister had always 
asserted that the measures of coercion which 
Great Britain might take on the coast of Syria 
and Egypt would fail. He expected the Pasha 
to offer a successful resistance to the English 
forces; he hoped that France might then be called 
in as a mediator ; that by her interposition the 
dominion of Meheraet Ali over Syria would be 
secured, and the French influence completely 
established along the shores of the Mediterra- 
nean. 

In a despatch to Mr. Bulwer, dated August 
31st, Lord Palmerston fully vindicated the 
course which he had taken, and proved M. 
Thiers to be hopelessly in the wrong. This 
able paper was printed and sent to all the courts 



M. THIERS AND LORD PALMERSTON. 269 

of Europe. It greatly increased the reputation 
of the Minister, and satisfied all candid minds of 
the fairness and ability with which he had con- 
ducted those difficult negotiations. M. Thiers' 
reply to this public document was feeble and 
inconsistent ; it only proved that he had never 
had a definite policy. The quibbling spirit in 
which he attempted to argue that the integrity 
and independence of the Ottoman Empire only 
meant the frustration of the plans of Russia and 
not the preservation of the Porte from the am- 
bition of Mehemet Ali, was utterly unworthy of 
a statesman. 

Lord Palmerston was not deterred by all the 
menaces of the French Minister, nor by all the 
excitement of the French people, from executing 
what he had determined. The energy and 
rapidity with which the operations were con- 
ducted offered a singular contrast to the long 
and tedious delays which France had caused 
before a final decision could be made. The 
work of the diplomatist had now ended ; the 
time for action had arrived. It was now to be 
seen how far M. Thiers' repeated assertions ot 
the inefficiency of the means with which Lord 
Palmerston proposed to reduce Mehemet Ali to 
submission, were correct; and whether success 
was to crown, or defeat to stigmatise, the policy 



270 FOREIGN POLICY. 

which the English Minister had adopted. It 
was indeed a moment of tremendous responsi- 
bility. The power and ability of Mehemet Ali 
were undoubtedly great. The peace of all 
Europe now depended on the speedy and com- 
plete success of our sailors and marines on the 
coast of Syria. One mistake, one moment of 
vacillation, and in the existing state of the 
French nation, all Europe would spring to arms. 
With the love for peace which was professed by 
so many respectable politicians, dismissal, dis- 
grace, and even impeachment might be the fate of 
the brilliant statesman who failed in such a bold 
stroke of policy. The Duke of Marlborough in 
the battle-field when the bullets rained most 
thickly, never showed more bravery than Lord 
Palmerston as he calmly awaited, in the unima- 
ginative atmosphere of Downing Street, the issue 
of his great combination, and the proverbial 
hazards of war. 

No time was lost. Mehemet Ali was imme- 
diately informed of the terms which the Sultan, 
by the advice of the four Powers, was disposed 
to grant. He endeavoured to negotiate directly 
at Constantinople. His proposals were not 
accepted ; and without consulting the allies, the 
government of the Porte pronounced his formal 
deposition from the Pashalic of Egypt. Of this 



OPERATIONS IN SYRIA. 271 

step Lord Palmerston disapproved ; and as- 
surances were given to France that it was not 
to be considered a final sentence. The coasts of 
Syria and Egypt were declared to be in a state 
of blockade. Admiral Stopford, with the British 
fleet, some Turkish vessels, and two Austrian 
frigates, approached Beyrout. After a bom- 
bardment of four days, Soli man Pacha, with 
the Egyptian troops under his command, was 
compelled to evacuate the town. Commodore 
Napier took Si don by storm, and ever ready for 
action either by sea or land, advanced into the 
mountains and defeated Ibrahim Pasha. The 
Lebanon was soon cleared, Ibrahim's army, 
from which France expected so much, dispersed, 
and himself a fugitive. But the most illustrious 
and decisive exploit of all was the capture of the 
great and, it was deemed, impregnable fortress 
of St. Jean d'Acre, the key to all the military 
positions of Syria and to the Empire of the 
East. To the surprise of all the world and to 
the incredulous wonder of the population of 
Syria and Egypt, it was taken by the British 
squadron after a bombardment of three hours. 
At two o'clock in the afternoon the firing 
commenced ; at five it ceased, and the Egyptian 
troops began rapidly to leave the town which 
had been reduced in a short time, so destructive 



272 FOREIGN POLICY. 



had been the fire of the, ships, to a, heap of 
smoking and blackened ruins. The next morn- 
ing the fortress was formally restored by the 
English Commodore to the authority of the 
Sultan. 

This series of rapid, brilliant, and triumphant 
actions effectually did Mehemet Ali's business. 
In two months the bugbear which to France 
appeared of such portentous magnitude had been 
made, by the genius and vigour of the English 
Foreign Secretary, and the skill and valour of the 
English sailors, to dwindle into very harmless 
dimensions. England had put forth her strength 
for a moment, and only for a moment : and the 
greatness of Mehemet Ali, and the impending poli- 
tical convulsions of the East, had vanished before 
it like a dream. The means which M. Thiers had 
but a few months before pronounced quite inade- 
quate to the purposes in view, had proved 
quite sufficient. Even the dreaded advance of 
the Russian forces to Constantinople had been 
avoided, and all necessity for such interference 
obviated. By insisting that England should 
send three ships of war through the Dardanelles 
whenever the Russian fleet entered the Bos- 
phorus, Lord Palmerston had given Russia a 
powerful motive for not acting at all except in 
the last extremity. The Russian fleet was lying 



CHANGE OF THE FRENCH MINISTRY. 273 

idly at Sebastopol while the English squadron 
was acting so decisively in Syria. 

Before all the operations against Mehemet Ali 
had been undertaken, M. Thiers, happily for the 
peace of the world, ceased to be prime minister 
of France. On the bombardment of Bey rout 
he asked the King to sanction the immediate 
completion of the armament, the speedy convo- 
cation of the Chambers, and the departure of 
the fleet for Alexandria, to give by its presence 
what he termed, a moral support to Mehemet 
Ali. The King of the French, as anxious for 
the maintenance of peace as his prime minister 
was eager for war, rejected these demands. 
The Ministry resigned. By the mediation of 
the Duke of Broglie the quarrel was for the 
moment patched up ; but when the time for the 
preparation of the King's speech drew near, the 
ministers again renewed their proposals which 
were again rejected ; and the Ministry finally 
retired. M. Guizot was sent for from London, 
and a cabinet in which he held the office of 
Foreign Secretary, and Marshal Soult those of 
President of the Council and Minister of War, 
was formed. As M. Guizot had always been 
warmly attached to England, these ministerial 
changes were considered favourable to the 
maintenance of peace. 



274 FOREIGN POLICY. 

But it is right to acknowledge that to Louis 
Philippe the chief merit is due of having 
prevented the breaking out of hostilities. Since 
it will be necessary to speak of the policy which 
he pursued some years later with strong disap- 
probation, it is only just to allow him the glory 
of endeavouring at this moment of frenzy to 
bring the French nation into a better temper, 
and of discountenancing the violent schemes of 
his ministers. Louis Philippe lived to be a 
recreant to honourable, just, and liberal prin- 
ciples. He lived to be the enemy of Lord 
Palmerston, who would not support his selfish 
plans for the aggrandisement of his family. He 
lived to be in his old age an outcast and a 
wanderer, and his bones are buried in a foreign 
soil. But Englishmen, as they look upon his 
tomb and reflect on the vanity of all earthly 
grandeur, may forgive the errors and crimes 
which the King of the French committed in the 
last years of his reign, on remembering the words 
he uttered at Boulogne, when the cry for war 
against " perfidious Albion " was resounding 
throughout France. " As long as I live," said 
he, " there shall be peace between France and 
England." 

The excitement was beginning to subside. 
Other subjects of interest were dividing the at- 



CAPTURE OF ACRE. 275 

tention of the gallant nation with the slights 
which it imagined the honour of France had 
received in the Eastern dispute. The wickedness 
of Madame Laffarge made the Parisians partly 
forget the wickedness of Lord Palmerston. The 
Chambers had assembled, the new Ministry were 
successful in every division, when the news of 
the capture of Acre arrived in Paris, and once 
more drove the French people almost beside 
themselves with rage and mortification. This 
was the very fortress which, when defended by 
Sir Sidney Smith and his brave seamen, had re- 
sisted all the efforts of Napoleon, and stopped 
the conqueror in -his victorious career. In 1799 
Buonaparte had himself confessed that in this 
town the fate of the East was involved ; in 1840 
the success of the campaign in Syria depended 
on the impression which the English cannon 
might make on the same battlements. Its cap- 
ture by Napier was as fatal to the power of 
Mehemet Ali as its defence by Sir Sidney Smith 
had been to the destiny of Napoleon. But it 
had resisted Napoleon and his triumphant legions 
for many weeks ; the siege had been conducted 
on the most scientific principles; torrents of 
blood were shed and prodigies of French valour 
performed. From an attack which had not 
lasted one autumn afternoon, Acre had now 

T 2 



276 FOREIGN POLICY. 

fallen. Such success seemed miraculous. Lord 
Palmerston for a short time was to the French 
nation what he is still to General Count Ficquei- 
mont, a devil in human form, whose machina- 
tions were execrable, but whose power was 
irresistible. 

It was well that M. Guizot could reply to all 
the remonstrances of the advocates of war that 
Mehemet All's expulsion from Syria was an ac- 
complished fact. Had the struggle been pro- 
tracted, had the Pasha been in any degree suc- 
cessful, both the King of the French and his philo- 
sophical minister might have been unable to resist 
the popular torrent which was rushing so furiously 
to war. It was the reliance upon the support of 
France which had made Mehemet Ali, when his 
strength was still unbroken, persist in his pre- 
tensions. Now, however, France counselled sub- 
mission and the Eastern difficulty rapidly ap- 
proached its termination. 

Napier, covered with the laurels he had so 
recently won, appeared off Alexandria. He en- 
tered into a convention with Mehemet Ali, by 
which the Pasha agreed to evacuate Syria and 
deliver up the Turkish fleet as soon as he was 
officially assured that the Sultan had granted to 
him the hereditary possession of Egypt. The 
Porte, however, was now inflated with victory, 



TEEATY OF THE loTH JULY, 1841. 277 

and for a time refused to reinstate Mehemet Ali 
in the Government of Egypt, Admiral Stopford, 
Napier's superior officer, also thought that 
the hero of Acre had gone beyond his powers in 
signing the Convention, and refused to sanction 
the arrangement. A mischievous delay might 
have occurred. But Mehemet Ali was dispirited 
and overawed. He was informed by the autho- 
rity of the English Government that he would 
be maintained in the pashalic of Egypt if he 
avouM within three days evacuate Syria and sur- 
render the Turkish fleet. He professed his en- 
tire submission, and threw himself at the feet of 
the Allied Powers. Some perplexing difficulties 
still remained at Constantinople, but they were 
merely technical ; Mehemet Ali was defeated, 
Syria restored to the Sultan, the east tranquil- 
lised: Lord Palmerston had triumphed. 

And now nothing remained but to restore the 
good relations with France which in the course 
of these eventful negotiations had been unfortu- 
nately interrupted. In a few months this also 
was accomplished. On the 13th of July 1841, 
a treaty which Lord Palmerston regarded as an 
act of reconciliation between France and the rest 
of Europe was concluded. 

This celebrated document, on which so much 
has depended and may yet depend, was not prolix. 

T 3 



278 FOREIGN POLICY. 

In 1809 England bound herself to respect the 
sanctity of the Dardanelles which she had forced 
some time before, and agreed that no ships of 
war under her flag should enter the straits 
without the consent of the Porte. So far as 
England was concerned the treaty therefore left 
matters just as they had previously been. But 
now the other Powers took the same engagement. 
Russia also made a general renunciation of any 
intention of obtaining an exclusive ascendancy 
in Turkey. The integrity and independence of 
that state was declared by the five Powers to 
be of essential importance to the world, and the 
Ottoman Empire was formally taken under the 
protection of all Europe. 

This was the spirit and plain meaning of the 
treaty of 1841, about which so much has been 
said and written. Lord Palmerston has posi- 
tively asserted it to be, what all the statesmen 
of Europe at the time considered it, a complete 
abandonment on the part of Eussia of the treaty of 
Unkiar Skelessi. He believed that it settled the 
relations of the Ottoman Empire with the Govern- 
ments of Europe, on a much more satisfactory 
foundation than had ever before been established. 
In fact, until now, Eussia was the only one of 
the great Powers of Europe which could justly 
be thought to have had a policy in the East ; the 



TREATY OF THE 13TH JULY, 1841. 279 

other Governments had left the fate of Turkey 
to be decided by the chapter of accidents./ The 
consequence was that Russia had nearly gained 
everything, and Western Europe almost lost 
everything. The treaty of the 13th of July — 
July seems to have been with our statesmen the 
chosen month for treaties on the affairs of Turkey 
— did do much for Europe, if it did not do all 
that sagacious and far-sighted statesmen might 
think necessary for permanent tranquillity. What 
it accomplished, it accomplished without war. It 
was essentially a pacific arrangement. Without 
rousing the apprehensions of Russia, it put into 
a definite shape the fears and the hopes of Europe, 
and thus indicated the means and provided the 
nucleus of a better system than had yet been 
thought possible. 

The way to judge of the value of this treaty 
and of the ability of the British Minister whose 
name is attached to it, is not to examine it by any 
abstract principles of what may be necessary 
after a war for the security of Europe and the 
independence of Turkey ; but to compare it with 
the treaties of Adrianople and Unkiar Skelessi, 
and with the chaotic state of things which it 
superseded. In an indirect manner it did carry 
out the design which Prince Metternich en- 
tertained in 1828, of placing the integrity of the 

T 4 



280 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Ottoman Empire under the public guarantee of 
the Great Powers. If allowance be made for 
the circumstances of the time, this treaty may 
well be acknowledged to be one of the most 
masterly achievements of an ETriglish statesman.] 
The principle it contained, though imperfectly 
developed, was of universal application. It 
might easily be extended ; it could not, without 
a violation of the public law of Europe, be set 
aside. Before this treaty was agreed to, what- 
ever step Eussia might take in the East was a 
mere question of policy and of convenience ; 
she could now make no attempt on the inde- 
pendence of the Porte without breaking her 
plighted faith, and giving all the other four 
Powers a right, which would become a duty, to 
oppose her by force of arms. The present 
alliance of the Western Powers and the nominal 
adhesion of the Germau Courts to their prin- 
ciples, are indeed the necessary results of this 
Treaty of 1841. 

Throughout the two years this Eastern crisis 
continued, Mr. Urquhart was eloquently pro- 
phesying that Lord Palmerston would betray 
Turkey to Russia. Now that it was terminated, 
Mehemet Ali beaten, and the treaty ratified, it 
was necessary he should justify himself in the 
eyes of the multitude by showing that his pro- 



TREATY OF THE 13TH JULY, 1841. 281 

phecies had been fulfilled. He affirmed that 
the clause prohibiting the ships of war of the 
five Powers from entering either the Straits of 
the Bosphorus or the Dardanelles in a time of 
peace without the consent of the Sultan, was all 
that Kussia required, and instead of abrogating, 
really confirmed, the treaty of Unkiar Skelessi. 
Some politicians, who are by no means inclined 
to agree with Mr. Urquhart in other respects, 
have also, since the commencement of the present 
war, expressed their dissatisfaction with this 
diplomatic work of Lord Palmerston, and have 
thought that the Dardanelles and the Black Sea 
should be open at all times to the fleets of 
France and England. They have even gone so 
far as to say with Mr. Urquhart, that nothing 
more would be necessary for destroying the 
ascendancy of Russia and frustrating her de- 
signs in the East, because with the Black Sea 
and the Straits once free, everything else must 
inevitably follow. 

This question is of so much importance that 
it is quite necessary it should be thoroughly 
understood. Unless just ideas are entertained 
upon it, all the sacrifices and exertions the 
people of France and England are making will 
be in vain. It is not by any means the simple 
matter which it at first sight appears. In con- 



282 FOREIGN POLICY. 

senting to the exclusion of ships of war from the 
Dardanelles, Lord Palmerston did nothing more 
than acknowledge the right of the Sultan to the 
control of the stream which was bounded on 
both sides by Turkish territories. The prin- 
ciple on which he acted, and which he took care 
to explain to Baron Brunnow, can scarcely be 
questioned by those who represent themselves 
/as especially the friends of Turkey. It was this, 
I that as the jurisdiction of every state extended 
to three miles beyond low- water mark, and as 
the Dardanelles and the Bosphorus were in 
general not more than six miles wide, the au- 
thority of the Porte was by international law 
unquestionable over both these Straits, which 
were at once the keys of the Black Sea and the 
Mediterranean. Yet the politicians who are so 
anxious at once to defend Turkey and see the 
Black Sea open to the line-of-battle ships of all 
the world, must commence to carry their 
theories into practice by abrogating this right 
of the Sultan over his own seas. A singular 
method of securing the integrity of the Ottoman 
Empire, and of doing away with all foreign 
interference which is said to have done so much 
mischief! 

And is it so certain that should these Straits 
become a highway to the navies of all nations, 



TREATY OF THE 13TH JULY, 1841. 283 

that the advantages would be all on the side of 
the Western Powers ? The same arrangement 
which would give the right of entrance to the 
Black Sea to France and England, would give , 
the same right of entrance into the Mediter- I 
ranean to Russia. Russian ships of war might 
then, according to this notable plan for pro- 
tecting Turkey, anchor at any time under the 
walls of the Seraglio, overawe Constantinople, 
and command the windows of every drawing 
room. A pleasant spectacle for the idle gazers 
from the banks of the Bosphorus ! An admir- 
able sedative to the placid dreamers on a Turk- 
ish divan ! A sure way of providing for all 
contingencies ! 

The most powerful state in the world would 
be ruined by such means of strengthening it. 
No plan was ever less adapted for the safety of 
such an empire as that of Turkey, with insur- 
rections so frequently arising in the capital. 
The best course to adopt may be doubtful ; but 
with the naval forces of Russia still powerful in 
the Black Sea, there can be no doubt that this 
arrangement would be the worst. On such a 
question it is impossible at the present moment 
to express a decided opinion. It demands the 
gravest attention of statesmen. But in 1841 
the power of Russia in the Black Sea was pre- 



284 FOREIGN POLICY. 

ponderant, and every candid person must con- 
clude that Lord Palmerston did the best he 
could under the circumstances in agreeing to 
the treaty. The terms were not indeed equit- 
able ; to have made them in any degree fair, the 
entrance to the Dardanelles should have been 
made to depend on the passage of the Pruth by 
Russia, or on the event of any invasion of 
Turkish territories. But this inequality was 
partly obviated by the declaration of the five 
Powers in favour of the independence and in- 
tegrity of Turkey. The Sultan might now, 
when any attack was threatened, call for the 
assistance of his allies, and open the Dardanelles 
to the fleets. Had France acted cordially with 
England throughout the two years of negoti- 
ation, there can be no doubt that even in 1841, 
still more advantages might have been acquired. 
But as, through no fault of Lord Palmerston, 
the union of the two "Western Powers had been 
broken, it cannot be denied that unsupported as 
he was, he made the best of the occasion. To 
all sagacious observers it was evident that the 
English statesman was pressing Russia hard; 
and that ever since the treaty of Unkiar 
Skelessi the Emperor Nicholas was losing his 
exclusive hold on Turkey. It was a great 
diplomatic error indeed to force the treaty of 



TKEATY OF THE 13TH JULY, 1841. 285 



Unkiar Skelessi on the Sultan at all. It at once 
showed the Governments of Europe their dan- 
ger, and suggested the means of prevention. 

There was no doing away with the immense 
moral effect which the brilliant naval operations 
in Syria had produced on the excitable minds of 
the natives of the East. The fall of Acre had 
astounded them ; in the tents of the Arabs the 
names of Palmerston and England were whispered 
with fear and reverence. Who could measure 
the strength of that nation, which had so easily 
and so rapidly accomplished such mighty results ? 
Unaccustomed to enter into reasons of state, they 
only judged by what they had witnessed. They 
saw that Russia remained quiescent, while Eng- 
land acted with energy and decision; and the 
star of the Emperor Nicholas seemed pale to their 
wondering gaze, while that of Queen Victoria 
shone upon them brightly and gloriously from 
the western heaven. 

But it was not in the East alone that the 
vigour and success of Lord Palmerston's Foreign 
Policy had worked a great change in the minds 
of men. Englishmen have naturally much pa- 
triotism. They now forgot their mere party 
prejudices in hearty admiration of the Foreign 
Secretary of the Melbourne Government. Lord 
Palmerston had gradually risen in public estima- 



286 FOREIGN POLICY. 

tion, as his colleagues had declined. In 1831 
his claim to such an important office, as that of 
the Secretaryship for Foreign Affairs, had been 
questioned. Ten years had passed away, and the 
popularity of the great chiefs of the first Eeform 
Ministry had departed. They had quarrelled 
among themselves ; some of them had gone over 
to the Conservative benches; the credit for 
statesmanship of the remaining Whig statesmen 
had long been on the wane. Lord Palmerston, 
whom they once patronised, was now their main- 
stay. While the Ministry was breaking up, the 
Foreign Secretary preserved his reputation un- 
damaged in the general wreck, 

On domestic questions the greatest differences 
of opinion prevailed in Parliament. The country 
was tired of the long dominion of the Whigs. 
They were assailed, it must be admitted, with 
much unfairness ; they suffered much unmerited 
obloquy. It was easy to find fault with them, but 
not so easy to substitute better measures than 
those which they, in their last extremity, pro- 
posed for the consideration of the nation. But 
the people were not yet prepared to appreciate 
the commercial policy of the Ministers. The 
finances were in a most unsatisfactory state. 
The weakness of the Government was plain to 
every understanding. Jealous and powerful in- 



LORD PALMERSTON AND THE WHIG CABINET. 287 

terests, trembling with selfish anxiety for their 
monopolies, threw all their weight into the scale 
of the Opposition. 

Six weeks and four days after the Treaty of the 
13th of July was signed, the Whig Ministry, in 
consequence of their defeat on the Address, re- 
tired. This is a fact of no slight importance in 
estimating the many obstacles which Lord Pal- 
merston had surmounted. He knew not how long 
he might continue Foreign Secretary. The Mi- 
nistry might resign office at any time. On any 
day the superintendence of these intricate negotia- 
tions might be handed over to another statesman ; 
but he had no reason to complain of his country- 
men. He was enthusiastically applauded by the 
whole nation. Faction for a moment forgot to 
howl. Malevolence was silent. Even the rage 
of those great egotisms called " great interests," 
was not directed against the Foreign Secretary. 
Whigs and Tories, Protectionists and Free 
Traders, joined with one voice in admiration of 
the statesman who had acted so intrepidly and 
wisely, the leading part in that great emergency. 
He stood forth from among his humble and de- 
feated colleagues, as the representative of a great 
national policy. In an age priding itself on its 
economical and prosaic disposition, he had given 
to the Foreign Policy of England something of a 



288 FOREIGN POLICY. 

heroic character. He had shown that, even in 
the present state of Europe, with Governments 
existing on no principle, and adopting the 
poorest means for attaining the most paltry ends, 
an English statesman, if he were worthy of his 
calling and of the great nation which he professed 
to govern, might still, by commanding energy, 
make other rulers, even in their own despite, obey 
his impulse, and cause his power and will to be 
felt and respected to the farthest limits of the 
civilised world. 



289 



CHAP. IX. 

THE POWER OF ENGLAND. EXTENT OF DOMINION. DIS- 
PUTES WITH AMERICA. — NORTHERN BOUNDARIES. — RIGHT 

OF SEARCH. — TREATY OF WASHINGTON. INVASION OF 

AFFGHANISTAN. — CONSIDERATION OF INDIAN POLICY. 

The Foreign Secretary of this great empire 
ought to possess superhuman faculties. So ex- 
tensive are the dominions over which he must 
exert some kind of presiding influence, that he 
ought to know everything, to see everything, to 
be present everywhere and at all times. Seated 
in Downing Street he has to look down from his 
lofty elevation with serene and affable dignity on 
all the provinces and dominions under the sway 
of his Royal Mistress. 

Much ingenuity and eloquence has been dis- 
played in picturing the mighty power of the 
Emperor of Russia, extending so far from north 
to south, from east to west. His dominion may 
be mighty, and may menace the independence of 
the Western states and the balance of power in 

u 



■■■^MBHH 



290 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Europe. It has rapidly increased, and ought 
now, when the opportunity presents itself, to be 
diminished. But we must not delude ourselves. 
It is possible to present a sketch of the terri- 
torial, political, and commercial greatness of 
England quite as imposing as that with which 
our minds have been dazzled of the greatness 
of the Autocrat of all the Russias. 

At this very time Mehemet Ali was not the 
only potentate who learnt from experience the 
might of England. While the negotiations and 
demonstrations relating to the Turkish Empire 
were in progress, we had other work on our 
hands. Our soldiers were entering Candahar 
and Ghuznee ; our sailors were approaching 
Canton and disturbing the august slumbers of 
his celestial majesty. Chinese mandarins were 
drowning themselves and cutting their own 
throats in despair at the terrible spectacle of the 
efforts of the English barbarians, when the won- 
derful tidings of the capture of Acre were being 
carried from caravan to caravan, from camel- 
driver to camel-driver in the Great Desert. 

So transcendently was the military and naval 
power of England exerted in the different parts 
of the globe that French and American politicians 
were filled with envy. Their language with re- 
spect to England indeed curiously resembles that 



VAST EXTENT OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE. 291 

of Mr. Urquhart with respect to Russia. The 
right of search had long been to them the cause of 
much suspicious animosity. They pointed to our 
African squadron as an instrument for extend- 
ing our commerce, and not as a proof of our 
love for suffering humanity. The philanthropy 
of England was in their opinion mere hypocrisy. 
England had military stations in all parts of the 
globe ; by the fortress of Gibraltar and Malta, her 
occupation of the Ionian Islands, and her suc- 
cesses in Syria, she was now the undisputed 
mistress of the Mediterranean. She was omni- 
potent in India ; but not content with her Eastern 
empire, she was now meditating the conquest of 
China. By the possession of St. Helena and the 
Cape of Good Hope, all the commerce along those 
boundless shores became her own. The Falk- 
land Islands secured to her all the trade passing 
round Cape Horn. Trinidad gave her all that 
was necessary for exclusive dominion in the 
Caribbean Sea. She was armed at all points. 
She never rested, never hesitated, but was ever 
pushing onward without fear and without rash- 
ness; relying on the wisdom of her statesmen, 
the energy of her people, and the valour of her 
armies.* 

* This is no exaggeration of the jealous feeling prevalent 
in the United States and in France at this period. It is a 

u 2 



292 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Such were the ideas then entertainer] of the 
British power by statesmen in Paris and Washing- 
ton. There was something unworthy of two great 
nations in this petty jealousy; but they had 
some excuse for the feeling. The convention of 
the 15th of July 1840, though at length acquiesced 
in by the French Government, was neither for- 
gotten nor forgiven. With the United States 
we had many disputed questions, some of which 
dated from the treaty by which their indepen- 
dence was acknowledged by England, in 1783. 
\y There were others of more recent origin. The 
right of search as it affected the vessels sailing 
under the flag of the United States in the African 
seas, had grown up since England had commenced 
her crusade against slavery ; but it might be con- 
sidered as the mere assertion, in a different form, 
and in a time of peace, of what we had formerly 
maintained in a time of war. This difference 
was not, like some others, merely between the 
United States and England. Lord Palmerston 
had zealously exerted himself to get all nations 
to acknowledge this right of search, by treaty ; 
it was admitted to be a violation of strict inter- 
national law ; and that no slaver of any nation 

literal representation of facts as they are expressed in a re- 
port of a Committee on Foreign Affairs to the House of 
Representatives, IT. S., 13th of February, 1841. 



EIGHT OF SEARCH. 293 

could be captured by a British ship of war unless 
a treaty on the subject had been signed by that 
particular power. With the extension of con- 
stitutional freedom this right had been extended. 
They went, such was Lord Paimerston's inde- 
fatigable energy, hand in hand together. 

In 1831 and 1833, when the friendship of 
England was of so much importance to the 
struggling constitutional monarchy of France, the 
government of the king of the French had con- 
sented to a partial recognition of the right. 
Another treaty of a much more decided nature 
was being negotiated, when the disagreement on 
the affairs of Turkey broke out ; but this business 
was brought to a stand, and when Lord Palmer- 
ston left office, had not been finally settled. The 
admission of the right of search was considered 
as one of the tacit obligations which nations 
contracted when they were assisted by the En- 
glish minister in their constitutional attempts, 
and their governments could not do less than 
acknowledge it, though not always with the 
best grace. Prussia, Austria, and Eussia were 
not likely to have any of their subjects engaged 
in the slave-trade, and they at last consented to 
agree to the same treaty. But what the despots 
of the Old World agreed to on behalf of the 
slave, the enlightened republicans of the new 

u 3 



294 FOREIGN POLICY. 

pertinaciously refused to concede. The truth 
of the matter was just as Lord Palmer ston 
declared it to be ; it was not so much the honour 
of the American flag as the institution of slavery 
itself, which was thus indirectly but stubbornly 
upheld. None can doubt this opinion on perusing 
attentively the despatches of American states- 
men. Mr. Webster, the able advocate of the 
sanctity of the stars and stripes, expressed, even 
in his correspondence with English ministers, 
sentiments which those who believe, as every 
christian man in this country now happily does, 
legalised slavery to be contrary to every moral 
and religious principle, cannot read without 
horror. In fact, if there was any hypocrisy 
associated with this right of search it was not 
that of England who wished to maintain it, but 
that of the southern states of the Union, who most 
indignantly resisted it, and covered their selfish in- 
terests, narrow prejudices, and foul tyranny over 
their fellow creatures with the flag which was 
the symbol of their national honour. 

In the social condition of the United States, 
and with their deeply-rooted jealousy of England, 
this question was sufficiently serious. But there 
were disputes of a different kind which had been 
exaggerated by national susceptibility to such a 
magnitude as to disturb the pacific relations of 



AMERICAN BOUNDARY QUESTION. 295 

the two countries. The northern boundaries had 
never been precisely denned ; and statesmen, in 
the spirit of antiquaries, set themselves gravely 
to interpret the treaty of 1783 to gratify the 
pretensions of their countrymen. That treaty 
was drawn up by men who were entirely ignorant 
of the territories whose limits they attempted to 
settle ; nor was this ignorance surprising, when 
the inhabitants of Maine and New Brunswick, 
when the difference was so loudly canvassed 
both in England and America, were quite as 
ignorant. 

In 1830, Lord Aberdeen and the President of 
the United States had agreed to submit the 
points in dispute to an arbitrator ; and the king 
of the Netherlands was chosen for the honourable 
office of deciding the subject at issue between two 
great nations. The king of the Netherlands was 
as much perplexed as the British and American 
diplomatists had been from the want of all satis- 
factory knowledge of the unexplored regions. 
He however made his award. Lord Palmerston 
on coming into office was prepared to accept this 
decision. But difficulties intervened from the 
other side of the Atlantic, and this arbitration 
came to nothing. A joint commission was pro- 
posed by the President of the United States, and 
after a voluminous correspondence in 1837 and 

u 4 



296 FOREIGN POLICY. 

1838, Lord Palmer ston believed that it would 
be adopted. But on sending the draft of a 
convention to regulate proceedings, to America, 
he found that the ministers of the United States 
considered it unsatisfactory. The regulations 
which they in return proposed were not accepted 
by Lord Palmerston ; and he at last sent out a 
commission of his own to New Brunswick for 
examining the disputed territory. The British 
commissioners reported strongly in favour of the 
British claims. 

But had they intended to write a satire show- 
ing the contemptible nature of the controversy 
which threatened to hurry two great nations, 
connected by so many sacred ties, into a bloody 
and ruinous war, rather than a topographical de- 
scription of the regions through which the boun- 
dary line was supposed to pass, they could not, by 
the utmost efforts of imagination, have said any 
thing more to the purpose than what was con- 
tained in some of the opening paragraphs of their 
report to the Foreign Secretary. 

They found the land a wilderness. Maps 
could teach them nothing. A few American 
settlers whom they met in particular neighbour- 
hoods could teach them nothing. Nothing was 
known of the country nor of the sources of the 
river which watered the territory. Some Indian 



AMERICAN BOUNDARY QUESTION. 297 

hunters only occasionally broke the silence and 
desolation of the wild expanse. It was not 
from the ardent republicans of Maine, nor from 
the hardy agriculturists of New Brunswick, that 
any information could be obtained. Two in- 
telligent Indians whom the commissioners fortu- 
nately enlisted in their service, and who from 
having once hunted over these grounds possessed 
rude maps made by their own hands out of 
sheets of bark, were their sole guides in latitudes 
where no civilised man had ever before set his 
foot. They had scarcely concluded their labours 
when the winter set in with such violence that 
the industrious and patriotic commissioners were 
glad to make the best of their way homeward, to 
draw up their report in the more comfortable 
quarters of the Foreign Office.* 

The correspondence on the right of search and 
the north-eastern boundary was still going on 
and rapidly increasing in bulk when Lord Aber- 
deen again accepted the post of Secretary of 
State for Foreign Affairs in the government of 
Sir Robert Peel. He fully adopted the argu- 
ments Lord Palmerston had used on the right of 
search. He disclaimed, as Lord Palmerston had 

* Report of G. W. Featherstonhaugh, and Rich. J. 
Mudge, Commissioners, to Lord Palmerston, April 16th, 
1840. 



298 FORETGN POLICY. 

disclaimed, any right of searching American 
vessels, as such. But he maintained, as Lord 
Palmerston had maintained, that a visit from an 
English man-of-war to ascertain that a vessel 
really belonged to the nation whose colours 
she hoisted, was no violation of international 
law, and could afford no just ground of com- 
plaint. Much, however, was said on both sides. 
If one mail took out an able paper from the 
English minister, another soon brought back a 
scarcely less able reply from the other side of 
the Atlantic. There seemed to be no end to 
written arguments. But it was quite necessary 
that something satisfactory should at length be 
decided upon. In the unsettled state of the 
negotiations events were every day occurring 
more and more perilous to the friendship of 
England and the United States. Sir Robert 
Peel and Lord Aberdeen determined to send 
out a special ambassador, invested with full 
powers to negotiate a treaty on the two 
questions of the right of search and the 
boundary between New Brunswick and the 
States. Their choice of a plenipotentiary 
indicated the pacific spirit in which they had 
resolved to settle this troublesome business. 
Lord Ashburton had been the most eminent 
merchant of the most eminent mercantile country 



LORD ASHBURTON SENT AS AMBASSADOR. 299 

in the world. He had evinced, when the last 
war between the two nations was begun, his 
sympathy for the United States; his ideas on 
colonial questions were known to be extremely 
liberal. He sailed from England on his mission 
of peace in February 1842, and in a few weeks 
landed safely at New York. 

The vanity of the citizens of the Union was 
gratified by the arrival of this special ambassador 
from England. He was applauded and enter- 
tained with much enthusiasm. By the 9th of 
August the treaty of Washington was signed 
between Mr. Webster and Lord Ashburton, and 
the ratifications were to be exchanged at London 
in a few weeks. 

If slavery could be put down by words, 
nothing could be more satisfactory, as certainly 
nothing ever breathed a loftier moral tone, than 
some of the introductory passages of this treaty. 
Clarkson and Wilberforce might have exulted 
over the preamble. But if the evils generated 
by the practice of diplomatists could be eradicated 
by their saintly professions, this would be a 
beautiful world indeed. Who could suppose 
from the pious and mystical declarations in the 
bond which incorporated the Holy Alliance, that 
it was a mere instrument of some selfish and un- 
scrupulous despots who had leagued themselves 



300 FOREIGN POLICY. 

together against their own subjects for the worst 
purposes of tyranny ? Who could suppose from 
the treaty of Washington, in which the traffic in 
slaves is stigmatised as " criminal," in which the 
United States and England bind themselves to 
maintain an armanent of not less than eighty 
guns on the coast of Africa for its suppression, 
and in which they agree to remonstrate with 
the powers in whose territories slave markets 
are held, that one of these two nations had a 
most barbarous system of legalised slavery in its 
own dominions, and that one of the statesmen 
whose names were attached to it was in favour 
of its continuance? The right of search is not 
once mentioned in the treaty. It was neither 
abandoned nor admitted. The general declaration 
against slavery expressed in the treaty of Ghent, 
were reasserted with the additional clause for the 
maintenance of a certain force. 

But Lord Ashburton cannot be blamed for not 
obtaining better conditions for the slave. He 
only conformed to those circumstances to which 
all statesmen must more or less . submit. The 
most stringent treaty with the United States for 
the suppression of slavery must be useless as long 
as slavery, as an institution, exists in the great 
republic. It is beginning at the wrong end. It 
is not on the high seas, but in the Southern 



TREATY WITH THE UNITED STATES. 301 

States of the Union that the first effectual blow 
at the existence of slavery can be struck. As 
long as there is a demand for negroes, notwith- 
standing the resolutions of Exeter Hall and the 
humanity of British legislators, the market will be 
supplied. As it is, while we domineer over the 
slave-traders of Spain and other humble na- 
tions, we are really coercing the weak, and al- 
lowing the great sinner, because he is strong, 
to go scot free. 

By the first seven articles of the treaty this 
northern boundary was at last defined, and 
all apprehensions of war arising from this dispute 
were extinguished for ever. This is the conso- 
latory fact, in comparison with which, the ques- 
tion whether England conceded more than she 
justly ought to have done, is a very trifling one. 

The treaty was, however, strongly attacked by 
the Opposition in the session of 1843. The 
Ministers had humiliated England. They had 
sacrificed all the points at issue in order to main- 
tain peace. The honour of England had been 
disregarded by Lord Ashburton and Lord 
Aberdeen. These are the vulgar cries of all 
oppositions when peace by mutual concession 
has been preserved. Their value on this occasion 
must be judged by the value of the desolate 
regions through which the boundary line had 



302 FOREIGN POLICY. 

been drawn. Lord Palmerston's objections were 
indeed expressed with consummate ability, and 
were in the abstract not inappropriate. Undue 
concession certainly does occasionally endanger 
rather than secure peace. 

Yet it would seem that when a nation is to 
make a stand it should be for something really 
tangible ; when a great people takes up arms it 
ought to be for something worth fighting for. 
There is a dignity in concession as well as in re- 
sistance. When the difference is about such 
barren territories as those from which Her Ma- 
jesty's commissioners were nearly frozen out, 
there is as much glory in yielding some points 
for the sake of a permanent settlement, as in 
leaving the whole dispute open to the uncertain 
contingencies of the future. But that there had 
been no unworthy concessions must be evident 
from the fact that the terms agreed upon were 
more favourable to England than those which the 
King of the Netherlands had formerly awarded : 
and at that time even Lord Palmerston, who now 
blamed the treaty of Washington, was ready to 
accept that judgment. 

England had then enough of wars on her 
hands. She dictated a glorious peace ic China, 
and made a most advantageous commercial 
treaty with that self-complacent empire. The 



REVERSES IN AFFGHANISTAN. 303 

dark clouds which had been lowering over our 
Indian dominions ever since the government of 
Sir Kobert Peel entered office, were being 
gloriously dispelled. But the gloom which these 
calamities left on the minds of the people ren- 
dered them little disposed to commence new wars 
with a nation of their own blood for worthless 
territories. - 

The mere name of Affghanistan seems still 
synonymous with disaster. The series of mis- 
fortunes which followed each other in a sad and 
uninterrupted funereal procession can never be 
forgotten. They have obliterated the remem- 
brance of the patriotic exultation which the 
storming of Ghuznee and the march to Cabul 
produced in 1839. Some of the men who then 
most loudly applauded the policy of Lord Auck- 
land, afterwards, when the moment of disaster 
came, most reviled him and the Whig Govern- 
ment. They could not see that Lord Palmer- 
ston's foreign policy had nothing at all to do 
with the errors which had been committed, and 
from which the dreadful loss of the army of 
occupation proceeded. These errors were purely 
military ; they had not the slightest connection 
with the original policy of the expedition ; and 
to attribute the massacre in the Khoord Cabul 
Pass to Lord Palmerston is just as absurd as to 



304 FOREIGN POLICY. 

attribute the glory of the conquest of Scinde to 
Lord Aberdeen. 

When politicians in England became con- 
vinced of the danger of Russian aggression, and 
of the necessity of employing means to oppose it, 
the natural consequence was that the alarm 
should also spread as far as the English empire 
in the East. The year 1836, which has been 
indicated as the commencement of this an- 
tagonism to Russia at Westminster may also be 
considered the time when it became plainly 
evident at Calcutta. The failure of the commer- 
cial mission to Cabul, the unmistakable evidence 
of the presence of Russian agents in Persia and 
Afghanistan, were enough to disquiet the minds 
of Indian statesmen. Soon even more substan- 
tial reasons for apprehension were afforded, and 
events occurred which required the serious con- 
sideration of those who were entrusted with the 
administration of British India. A Persian 
army advanced against Afghanistan, and on 
the 23d of November 1837, laid siege to He- 
rat ; and it seemed clear that Cabul and Can- 
dahar were also to be seized upon as the base 
of further operations. Those who knew not 
where Herat was, nor what was the importance 
of the position, both in a military and political 
point of view, might deride the fears of the In- 



REVERSES IN AFFGHANISTAN. 305 

dian Government ; but it was impossible for 
statesmen to look with indifference on the move- 
ments of Persia and Russia. The Emperor 
Nicholas evidently thought the war of much im- 
portance, and his agents urged the Shah of 
Persia to proceed, and promised him assistance 
in money and men. Nor was it merely on the 
frontier and in the far north-west that the 
opinion of the approaching downfal of the East 
India Company was prevalent. The natives of 
India were in a state of feverish excitement; there 
were in the earth and in the heavens presages 
of revolt and trouble ; wild and anxious glances 
were cast on that threatening northern horizon ; 
men spoke to each other of the storm that was 
gathering on the mountains ; and it was openly 
prophesied in the greatest towns and the most 
remote villages of India, that the time was now 
coming when the English dominion would ter- 
minate. The Mahometan population prepared 
to welcome the Mahometan invaders; they con- 
fidently predicted that the white-faced infidels, 
who had so long lorded it over all true believers, 
would soon be driven into the sea. That ex- 
quisite political barometer, the public securities 
in India, rapidly fell, and pointed with its de- 
licate index to the coming storm. Black indeed 
to all who looked upon them, seemed the clouds 

x 



6[)b FOREIGN POLICY. 

that were bearing down upon the plains of India. 
An uneasy sense of an oppressive weight in 
the political atmosphere, was experienced at once 
by natives and English, from the highest to the 
lowest functionaries of the Company and the 
Crown. 

The Government at home as well as the Govern- 
ment in India received the most positive and 
authentic intelligence that intrigues were going 
on, and that plots were thickening for the over- 
throw of the English empire in Hindostan. 
Lord Palmerston remonstrated strongly with 
the Court of St. Petersburg ; Eussia disavowed 
some of her agents ; but still preparations were 
actively continued. The Governor-General and 
his advisers came to the resolution of meeting 
the danger half-way by placing a nominee of 
their own on the throne of Cabul, and of teaching 
the fierce tribes a useful lesson in their rocky 
wildernesses. If any thing could prove the 
apparent necessity of this resolution, it would 
be the fact that the instructions from England 
recommending this policy, and the despatches 
from India announcing to the Government at 
home that such was the decision of the Indian 
administration, crossed each other on the high 
seas. 

No policy seemed ever more justified by 



INVASION OF AFFGHANISTAN. 307 

necessity than this invasion of Affghanistan. 
No policy can be more triumphantly justified on 
all the principles which regulate the intercourse 
of states and kingdoms. It was not undertaken 
for the mere selfish purpose of conquest, but 
was purely a defensive policy. Those who look 
upon the reasons for the expedition not from the 
local and detached view of Indian politics, but 
from a comprehensive survey of the general 
European system, will not find their vision dis- 
torted by that bloody exhalation which rises 
before the eyes of some authors while on this 
subject, and altogether perverts their judgment. 
It is much to be regretted that one gentleman 
who writes with much ability, who generally 
thinks correctly, and whose knowledge of Indian 
affairs is great and unquestionable, has so far 
been misled by this optical delusion as to speak 
of the misfortunes at Cabul as the just punish- 
ment of an "unholy and unrighteous policy;" to 
picture all the sufferers in the business as work- 
ing under the influence of a curse ; and to quote 
texts of Scripture in order to make the retri- 
bution appear more awful and impressive.* 
Curses and Scriptural texts are rhetorical figures 

* Kaye's " History of the "War in Affghanistan," through- 
out, and particularly vol. ii. p. 250. and 670. 



308 FOREIGN POLICY. 

from which writers on recent political events 
would do well to abstain. If it was unholy and 
unrighteous for the British to invade Afghanis- 
tan, it was unholy and unrighteous for them to be 
in India at all. And there is as little real piety 
or humanity, as there is wisdom or justice, in 
depicting our gallant countrymen in the passes 
of Affghanistan as under the awful shadow of a 
Divine vengeance, when they were slaughtered 
by the knives and jesails of their barbarous and 
treacherous foes. 

On the 1st of October, 1838, the Governor- 
General issued his proclamation, in which it 
was announced that the British army would 
enter Affghanistan. Troops were soon on their 
march to the frontier. 

A great army crossed the Indus. Candahar 
was speedily in the possession of the British 
troops. The strong fortress of Ghuznee was 
taken by storm in two hours. The victorious 
army entered Cabul in triumph, and success- 
fully accomplished its mission. In the whole 
history of British India no campaign was ever 
more brilliantly executed than that of 1839, in 
Affghanistan. The residents in India were 
transported with joy ; the press of England 
applauded ; honours were showered on the 
leaders of the expedition. When Russia shortly 



INVASION OF AFFGHANISTAN. 309 

afterwards declared war against Khiva, and her 
armies advanced into districts so near to Af- 
ghanistan, where so many warlike chieftains 
were waiting impatiently for the promised sup- 
port of the Czar, the march of the British army 
to Cabul was considered a master-stroke of 
policy. It was regarded as a bold challenge 
thrown by England, from those mountain fast- 
nesses through which even Tamerlane was said 
to have bought his way, to all comers who 
should venture to dispute her ascendancy in 
Asia. 

Until the 2nd of November^ 1841, nothing 
had occurredffco excite the serious apprehensions 
of the army at Cabul. But the English were 
wrapped in an apathetic state of unconscious- 
ness of danger, and never awoke to the certainty 
of evil until their savage and cunning ene- 
mies were at their doors* In the midst of a 
disaffected and warlike population, far from 
their own frontier and from the reach of succour, 
the simplest military precautions were neglected. 
Eules of which every civilian can at once see 
the necessity, and which mere instinct would 
dictate to the rudest barbarians, were disre- 
garded by the British officers. The army was 
separated from its supplies. The cantonments 
were surrounded by hills which offered the 

x 3 



310 FOREIGN POLICY. 

greatest advantages to an assailant. No attempt 
had been made to strengthen the fortifications. 
Those dreadful defiles through which all commu- 
nications with India must pass, were held at Cabul 
by fierce tribes whom the English Commander 
had never, until it was too late, thought of secur- 
ing as friends, or guarding against as enemies. 
General Sale, on his way homewards, forced the 
Khoord Cabul Pass ; but before he had reached 
Jellalabad, the misfortunes at Cabul had begun. 
Flames were unexpectedly seen issuing from a 
house in the city, inhabited by Sir Alexander 
Burnes. News reached the Commander-in- 
Chief that the unfortunate gentleman who, sup- 
posing the attack to be scarcely serious, would 
not permit his guard to fire on his enemies, had 
been murdered with his brother and another 
Englishman. Some troops were sent to suppress 
a riot ; they found a rebellion. The canton- 
ments were soon besieged ; the commissariat,' 
through the extraordinary negligence of having 
been placed in a spot far from the reach of the 
body of the army, was destroyed by the enemy ; 
after a siege of some weeks provisions were 
exhausted, all resources were failing ; and the 
soldiers, who had so long been reposing in in- 
dolent security, now found themselves in danger 
of dying by 'starvation, or of being forced to 



FAILURE OE THE ATTEMPT.' 311 

surrender to their assailants, who were as fero- 
cious and as untameable as the tigers and 
hyenas that howled and laughed amid the dark 
jungle and steep precipices of those dreadful 
passes which separated them from their country- 
men. 

Negotiations commenced. The same fatuity 
which had brought the unhappy Englishmen 
into their difficulties attended them to their 
mournful catastrophe ; but the pity which is felt 
for their fate prevents their errors from being 
harshly condemned. It was agreed that all 
Afghanistan should be evacuated, that hostages 
should be given, and that provisions should be 
supplied to the troops on their homeward 
journey. On neither side was the engagement 
properly kept. The English envoy listened to 
private overtures which were only intended to 
ruin him; he, and those who accompanied him, 
were beguiled into an ambush ; the lifeless trunk 
of Sir William Macnaghten was ignominiously 
exhibited in the bazaar of Cabul ; and his com- 
panions to the place of conference were either 
murdered or carried into captivity. 

Again negotiations were resumed ; but harder 
terms were now proposed and accepted ; the 
troops were to leave the greater portion of their 
artillery. A hard winter set in. The snow fell 

x 4 



312 FOREIGN POLICY. 

in heavy flakes. The dispirited army at length 
began that fearful march which so few indivi- 
duals were to survive. It is needless to multiply 
details. When the troops left Cabul their num- 
bers were about 4,500 soldiers, and 12,000 
camp followers ; when they arrived at Jugdul- 
luck, a distance of but thirty-five miles, out of 
the whole host only 300 people remained. One 
single person alone arrived at Jellalabad to tell 
the tale of horror. Even the few officers and 
soldiers who had not been massacred on the 
road were prisoners. 

The insurrection extended to Jellalabad. 
Here it was met by a soldier of distinguished 
skill, courage, and resolution, who at all hazards 
determined to defend his position to the last, so 
that any of the miserable stragglers who should 
yet emerge from the denies might have a place 
to rally round. And now for the first time 
since the commencement of these disasters, we 
seem to be reading of the exploits of British 
soldiers. General Sale's conduct at that awful 
moment was above all praise ; he redeemed the 
military reputation of England in India ; by his 
heroic defence of Jellalabad, which was the key 
of Eastern AfFghanistan, the tide of war was 
once more turned, and rolled back upon the 
enemies of the British name. 



AFFGHANISTAN EVACUATED. 313 

The news soon reached Calcutta. Troops 
were slowly assembling, but with no definite 
object, when Lord Ellenborough arrived at the 
seat of government. The measures of the new 
Governor-General were, after some deliberation, 
vigorous and decisive. General Pollock marched 
from the Indus, fought his way through the 
Khybur Pass, and effected a junction with Sale 
and his brave comrades at Jellalabad. Some 
months were spent in recruiting the forces, and 
preparing for an advance. At length the army 
entered the formidable defiles, and completely 
routed their savage enemies wherever they 
ventured to offer any opposition. A great battle 
was fought ; victory returned to the British 
ranks ; and the English standard was proudly 
hoisted on the citadel of Cabul. In the mean- 
while, General Nott, having held his own po- 
sition at Candahar, wisely determined to join 
General Pollock at Cabul, that all resistance 
might be effectually put down. Thus the two 
armies, marching as on two sides of a triangle, 
met at the point where the first errors and mis- 
fortunes had originated, and our hold on Afghan- 
istan seemed again secured. 

But it had been resolved by the authorities in 
England and in India that these mountainous 
districts should be evacuated. The Governor- 



314 FOREIGN POLICY. 

General issued a proclamation, giving his reasons 
for that decision. The magnificent bazaar at 
Cabul was destroyed, and a considerable portion 
of the town reduced to ashes. Ghuznee, which 
had been lost, and again won in the course of 
the troubles, suffered the same fate. The armies 
marched homeward, leaving anarchy and con- 
fusion in their rear. Enraged to fury by the 
spectacle of the bones of their slaughtered 
countrymen bleaching in the winds, and scat- 
tered by the wild beasts which had fed upon their 
bodies, the troops committed many dreadful 
devastations as they passed by the scenes of the 
recent calamities. 

It is possible to approve of the resolution 
which the Government took of abandoning Aff- 
ghanistan in 1842, without joining in the loud 
clamour which was raised against the Govern- 
ment of 1838. That clamour was in every 
respect disgraceful to the fickle multitude who 
joined in it, and who were in haste to make 
amends for their former indiscriminate appro- 
bation by equally indiscriminate censure. The 
time, perhaps, has now come when these rash 
judgments of the moment may be corrected, 
and the events in Afghanistan impartially con- 
sidered without going off into hysterics. No- 
thing is more unjust than to judge of the policy 



RUSSIAN INVASION OF INDIA. 315 

of yesterday by the blind panic of to-day, and 
•regardless of the great to-morrow. That suffi- 
cient for the day is the good or the evil of it, is 
no infallible maxim, even when applied to the 
contracted interests of an individual ; it is the 
height of folly when applied to the expansive 
necessities of a great nation. 

England has not yet done with AfFghanistan. 
The time may not be far distant when our Indian 
army shall, under happier auspices, complete the 
work which was planned in 1838, apparently 
accomplished in 1839, and apparently abandoned 
in 1842. A war with Kussia was once declared 
by English statesmen to be an improbability ; it 
was barely admitted to be a possibility ; it is 
now a fact. It is also a fact, that before the 
forces of the Autocrat met with those reverses 
on the Danube, and about the Caucasus, which 
have compelled him to confine his operations to 
a defence of his own territories, that a Eussian 
army was on the point of marching for Cabul. 
There can be no doubt what its fate would have 
been ; but there can be as little, that, had not 
so many adverse circumstances happened to 
Russia nearer home, the experiment would have 
been tried. The Emperor Nicholas has never 
meditated an attack on our Indian frontier by 
his own troops alone ; he relied on his gold and 



316 FOREIGN POLICY. 

on the venality of the robber chieftains, who, 
when supported by a small body of regular 
troops, would be ready, for pay and plunder, to 
undertake anything. Other conquerors have 
before now descended on India through those 
passes. Surely it is not absurd to conclude that 
what has been done before may be attempted 
again. 

On this question statistics are no infallible 
guide. Great conquerors have generally set the 
calculations of statistical tables at defiance. Men 
of science have not done enough to demonstrate 
the impossibility of an invasion of Hindostan 
from the north-west, when they show that the 
Russian commissariat is poor, and that thousands 
of soldiers must perish in the long march. Gold 
is as powerful as steel. At the exhibition of 
the yellow metal the wonderful metamorphosis 
of the old poet is every day accomplished ; every 
day, at the sight of this talisman, from dragon's 
teeth spring up armed warriors. What happened 
on the Sutlej but three years after our evacu- 
ation of Afghanistan, ought at least to teach us 
how dangerous it is to allow warlike powers to 
exist and strengthen themselves on our frontiers. 
In a moment, 70,000 fighting men, with a for- 
midable complement of artillery, and trained in 
the military science of Europe by French officers, 



HOW INDIA MUST BE DEFENDED. 317 

stood ready to contend against the British 
power, and the empire of Hindostan depended 
upon the result of one bloody and dubious day. 
The Governor-General at that time was fortu- 
nately himself a great soldier ; but all his skill 
and prowess was put to the test before the 
enemy was completely overthrown. He threw 
himself into the thickest of the conflict, and 
fought under the Commander-in-Chief; because 
he knew how serious the danger was, and that 
to falter would be destruction. Yet there were 
at that time profound sages in India and Eng- 
land, proving to their own satisfaction and the 
satisfaction of most of their readers, that England 
had nothing to fear from any enemy beyond the 
Indus, and that all who recommended the ne- 
cessity of timely precaution were foolish vision- 
aries. 

Even though the facts were as the opponents 
of Lord Auckland stated them, the conclusion 
drawn from them might still be questioned. It 
would be a miserable policy for a great empire 
to place its safety in deserts and mountains, and 
not on its own ability and readiness to resist all 
attacks. It is by her own courage and vigour 
that England has won and must keep India. 
What would be the conduct of a wise Governor- 
General should he have reason to believe that a 



318 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Russian and Persian invader was ; really ap- 
proaching ? He would not think of merely 
collecting his forces on the Indus, and there 
awaiting the advance of his assailants, with their 
wild auxiliaries from the mountains. As soon 
as he had received intelligence that a Russian 
army was advancing from the Caspian, and 
before it could effect a union with the troops of 
the Shah, and with all the predatory and war- 
like hordes that would be eager to join it, the 
Commander of the British forces would be 
ordered to march on Affghanistan, occupy Cabul, 
and siege Herat, which has been justly called 
" The Gate of India." Even those writers who 
have blamed the British Government for deciding 
on the invasion of Affghanistan when the Persian 
army, prompted by Russia, was besieging Herat, 
have been compelled to confess that it is on the 
possession of this very place, and the surrounding 
country, that the defence of India must depend.* 



* Mr. Kaye, in his elaborate and excellent work on 
Affghanistan, sinks the character of the historian in that of 
the advocate, in order to make the policy of 1838 appear in 
all respects erroneous. Yet even he quotes the military 
report on the defences of Herat, and says, " It is only by 
the Herat route that a really formidable well-equipped army 
could make its way upon the Indian frontier from the re- 
gions on the north-west. Both the nature and the resources 
of the country are such as to favour the success of the in- 



HERAT. 319 

It would then be criminal neglect to allow an 
enemy to establish himself in such a position. 
At any cost the Herat route would have to be 
held by the English forces ; and there, and not on 
the Indus, would the great battle have to be fought 
to decide who were to be the future masters of 
India. There the English general might laugh 
to scorn the efforts of every adversary. With 
all just precautions, such as were unfortunately 
neglected by Sir William Macnaghten and 
General Elphinstone, the British dominions in 
Hindostan would be unapproachable. Certain 
destruction would attend all assailants ; and the 
Indian Empire would be invulnerable from all ex- 
ternal enemies. The rapidity and brilliancy with 
which the humiliations of the army were re- 

vader. All the materials necessary for the organisation of a 
great army, and the formation of his depots, are to be found 
in the neighbourhood of Herat. The extraordinary fertility 
of the plain has fairly entitled it to be called the " Granary 
of Central Asia." Its mines supply lead, iron, and sulphur ; 
the surface of the country, in almost every direction, is 
laden with saltpetre ; the willow and poplar trees, which 
furnish the best charcoal, flourish in all parts of the country ; 
whilst from the population might at any time be drawn 
hardy and docile soldiers to recruit the ranks of an invading 
army. Upon the possession of such a country would depend, 
in no small measure, the success of operations undertaken 
for the invasion or the defence of Hindostan." — Kaye's 
History of the War in Affghanistan, vol. i. p. 203. 



320 FOREIGN POLICY. 

deemed in 1842, showed indisputably that 
England could, had she pleased, have held 
AfFghanistan. The withdrawal of the troops 
was a mere consideration of economy. The 
policy which Sir John M'Neil recommended, of 
converting the Affghans into a friendly nation, 
by strengthening their power, promoting a 
social compact amongst them, and thus erect- 
ing them into a barrier against all invaders from 
the north and west, has a very specious appear- 
ance. But it is in reality most insecure, and 
never could be long the means of peace and 
defence. We could not always depend on the 
continuance of the friendship of races habitually 
treacherous. The same strength and organis- 
ation we might establish in Afghanistan could 
be as easily turned against ourselves as against 
our enemies. In fact, with reason, or without 
reason, we should find ourselves compelled to 
guard against our own friends in AfFghanistan. 
The value of this policy had really been tried. 
It was tried with the Sikhs. It was with the 
protection and friendship of England that the 
Maha-rajah Runjeet Sing became the ruler of a 
powerful state. He died; and his army was 
turned against us ; our friends became our 
deadly enemies, whom we were obliged at last 



OUR INDIAN EMPIRE. 321 

to subdue. Is not the result of this experiment 
enough to show the impossibility of making 
eternal friends of warlike and barbarous races 
on our frontiers ? 

Lord Auckland went to India with the inten- 
tion of peacefully administering the government 
of the Indian Empire, and of acquiring no new 
territories. He was essentially a man of peace. 
But he found, as all other governor-generals have 
found, that it was impossible to fix any perma- 
nent boundaries to the British dominions in Hin- 
dostan. Lord Ellenborough, like his predecessor 
and successors, sailed for India with the most 
peaceful intentions. But he could scarcely have 
issued from Simla the proclamation in which he 
announced the evacuation of Afghanistan, and 
his adoption of "a pacific and conservative 
policy ;" he could scarcely have declared that the 
government of India was " content with the 
limits which nature appeared to have assigned to 
our Indian Empire," when he found himself 
obliged to resort to arms, and to undertake ano- 
ther conquest. Scinde was then subdued and 
added to our dominions ; and beneficent Nature 
made no complaint, though the East Indian Di- 
rectors did, but kindly accommodated herself to 
the circumstances which dictated the necessity of 
extending the frontier, and of vindicating our 

y 



322 FOREIGN POLICY. 

authority. The time soon came Avhen even Lord 
Ellenborough was accused of being too warlike ; 
and one of the reasons of his recal was that he 
was projecting more wars. Lord Hardinge then 
undertook the government of India, firmly 
attached to a pacific policy ; yet he had not been 
a year in office before another war began ; and 
in his first proclamation on the subject he de- 
clared another extension of the frontier, and the 
country between the Beas and the left bank of 
the Sutlej was annexed to the English territories. 
And not only so. The termination of the war 
and the stringent conditions of peace imposed by 
the Governor- General, left the government of La- 
hore nominally independent, but really in a state 
of vassalage ; and since then the whole of Kunjeet 
Sing's empire has been incorporated with the 
British dominions. Our advance has been resist- 
less and inevitable ; the tide of British con- 
quest is flowing onward and ever onward. It is 
as useless to command, like Canute, the billows 
on the sea shores to come no farther, as to 
stay the progress of England in Asia. The stern 
law by which we hold India neither permits us 
to retrograde nor to stand still. Wars are forced 
upon us, territories are annexed, and states are 
subjugated, by the very condition of our exist- 
ence. 



OUR INDIAN EMPIRE. 323 

The great problem of empire remains for us to 
solve in Afghanistan. Either we must govern 
these fierce tribes, or they will end by helping 
our enemies to govern us. Either we must rule, 
or be ruled. Limits, which were once thought 
settled for our Indian Empire, have long been 
passed ; races almost as wild as the Affghans 
have been tamed down and made obedient; from 
savage enemies they have been converted into 
brave Sepoys, who have faithfully followed the 
standard of England in bloody battle fields. 
Whatever may be said to the contrary, the rugged 
mountains of Affghanistan may one day become 
the citadels of our strength, and the impregnable 
bulwarks of our power. It is not, then, by the 
past, nor even by the present, but by the future, 
that the wisdom of this policy must be finally 
determined. 

At a time when the outcry against the policy 
which produced the invasion of Affghanistan was 
loudest, when the newspapers were still full of 
harrowing details of the calamities which had 
fallen on the unfortunate troops at Cabul, when 
invectives against all who had, or were supposed 
to have had, any share in originating the expe- 
dition were delivered in Parliament and through 
the press, Lord Palmerston stood forward, and 
with admirable moral courage declared, that this 

Y 2 



324 FOREIGN POLICY. 

policy was sound, and that, with ordinary pru- 
dence, it would have been successful. He was 
answered with shouts of derision. For a time 
his voice was drowned in the storm of indigna- 
tion which burst from the lips of honourable 
members. The tremendous ironical cheers which 
greeted the statesman as he proceeded, unawed 
by the rage he had provoked, to repeat his asser- 
tions, still ring in the ears of those who were 
present that night in the House of Commons. 
And when the great war that is now being waged 
shall have ended in great results ; when not only 
Turkey, but Central Asia also, shall be saved 
from the power of Russia ; when the " King of 
Kings" shall no longer remain under the delusion 
that his northern neighbour is his most powerful 
protector, and either British influence or British 
arms be omnipotent in Persia ; when Englishmen 
shall travel securely through every pass in 
Afghanistan, the power of^their nation be firmly 
established far beyond the Hindoo Koosh, and 
the Indus throughout the long course of its 
stream become one of the great highways for 
British commerce, these " derisive cheers " of 
short-sighted politicians ought to ring in the 
ears of posterity. 



325 



CHAP. X. 

lord Aberdeen's foreign policy continued to 1846. — 
the king op the french and his chamber of de- 
puties. affairs of spain and greece. count 

nesselrode's memorandum of 1844. - — oregon ques- 
tion. lord aberdeen. 

The history of our foreign policy during the five 
years of Sir Robert Peel's government is pecu- 
liarly barren in great events, or in great political 
controversies. Europe was at peace, and seemed 
resolved to remain at peace. Monarchs and their 
advisers endeavoured, by their mutual compli- 
ments and assurances, to persuade themselves 
and each other that the revolutionary hurricane 
was over, and that courts and thrones were now 
secure. The history of France at this time is a 
history of fulsome compliments exchanged be- 
tween the King of the French and his two repre- 
sentative Chambers. Louis Philippe assured the 
Deputies that they never before enjoyed such a 
good constitution, and the Deputies assured Louis 
Philippe that they never before had such a good 
king. Session after session these insincere decla- 

Y 3 



326 FOREIGN POLICY. 

rations were repeated, and both parties were 
painfully conscious of the falsehood they were 
acting and speaking, A collection of the 
addresses of the French Chambers to Louis Phi- 
lippe during his eighteen years of royalty would 
form a curious volume. It would clearly illus- 
trate the meaning of parliamentary government 
in France. It would abound in more foolish 
platitudes than were ever uttered by the repub- 
licans of the first revolution. The old repub- 
licans, with all their crimes, were at least in 
earnest ; but what can be said for those men who 
were devotedly attached to the Orleans dynasty 
in the evening, and became furious haters of 
monarchy in all its forms the next morning ? As 
the hour approached when the reign of the King 
of the French was to cease, and he was to fly 
from the soil of that beautiful France whose loy- 
alty to himself, his children, and his grandchil- 
dren had been so frequently paraded, the out- 
ward devotion of the Deputies to their poor idol 
increased in vehemence and extravagance. 

Louis Philippe wisely promoted the continu- 
ance of that English alliance which the treaty of 
the 15th of July, 1840, had so grievously endan- 
gered. He could not do otherwise ; for where 
but in England could the monarch of the barri- 
cades hope to find sincere support ? The King 



FRENCH POLITICS. 327 

of the French was wise in his generation ; he 
could look for no friendship from Russia, Prussia, 
nor Austria ; he could only trust in England. 
On this subject there has been much misconcep- 
tion. When Lord Palmerston was accused of 
ingratitude for deserting France, the nature of 
the connection between the two countries was 
not understood. No French politician has ever 
been able to deny that the support which England 
gave to the French constitutional monarchy in 
the first years of its existence was most valuable. 
Had it not been for England, there would have 
been in 1831, as in 1814, a general European 
combination against France : the monarchy of 
July was opposed, by the very fact of its 
being, to the legitimate monarchies of the Conti- 
nent : in upholding it, as the British ministers 
did, the antagonism of Europe was broken, and 
they conferred a great favour without receiving 
any in return. 

As time rolled on, and the King of the French 
thought himself more firmly seated on his throne, 
his obligations towards England were considered 
as an encumbrance. He was eager to show to 
the world that he could pursue an independent 
course of policy, and that he was not exclusively 
the ally of England. High and ambitious thoughts 
of founding a family now occupied his breast. 

Y <i 



328 FOREIGN POLICY. 

He became ashamed of his rank, as the Citizen 
King, and wished to rival the old European mo- 
narchs, That intense desire for matrimonial 
alliances with the proud despotic families of the 
Continent, which, when it once establishes itself 
in the hearts of constitutional princes, is sure to 
make them traitors to their sacred trust, and lead 
them step by step to their ruin, was no stranger 
to his bosom. His first hopes were directed 
towards Spain, where, by Lord Palmerston's 
energy, there had been erected at least the sem- 
blance of a free monarchy. He secured a worthy 
accomplice in his schemes in the person of the 
Queen Mother. Long before the Eastern differ- 
ences had arisen, Louis Philippe had taken 
a separate course in the peninsula, and had 
shown much mean jealousy of England. In 
1836, the alliance between the two Governments 
was evidently becoming less and less cordial. 
The French Government positively refused to 
adopt the measures which the English states- 
man proposed for the complete and immediate 
pacification of Spain. In Greece a keen rivalry 
was springing up. In the small states partly 
dependent on the Western Powers, there were 
at last seen French and English parties vio- 
lently opposed to each other. Lord Palmerston 
was not to blame for this state of things ; it 



FRENCH POLITICS. 329 

could easily be shown that in every instance he 
was purely on the defensive, and that it was the 
French ministers who first separated themselves 
from him, and not he who first became their 
opponent* At last the aggressions of Mehemet 
Ali demonstrated to all Europe the disagreement 
of the two Governments. Here again France 
chalked out a course for herself, and the com 
plaint plainly made by M. Thiers, and gently 
hinted by M. Guizot was, that Lord Palmerston 
did not give up his decided principles of policy 
for the sake of the friendship of France. There 
was something very unstatesmanlike in such a 
reproach. No country has a right to make its 
alliance the price of the abandonment of a course 
of policy which the minister of another country, 
when he supposed there was a perfect understand- 
ing between them, had conscientiously determined 
to follow. It would have been easy for Lord 
Palmerston to retort, that surely the friendship of 
England was worth more to France than the suc- 
cess of a usurper in Syria. The truth of the 
matter was, that the French Ministry were 
entirely dependent on the French Chambers, and 
that the representatives interfered so irregularly 
and so inconsiderately with the executive admi- 
nistration, that no steady policy could be carried 



330 FOREIGN POLICY. 

out in concert with England or with any other 
nation. 

Lord Aberdeen had not been many months in 
office, when he witnessed a striking exemplifica- 
tion of the strange and unprecedented manner 
in which the foreign affairs of France were now 
conducted. In the December of 1841, a con- 
vention for a still more effective suppression of 
slavery was signed by all the five Powers. The 
French Chambers interposed by a note which 
condemned the right of search as it had been for- 
mally conceded, and M. Guizot could not but 
refuse the ratification of the new treaty. The 
strongest argument used by the ardent deputies 
against this convention was, that it had been 
drawn up by Lord Palmerston, who had also 
signed the convention of the 15th of July, 1840. 
The English alliance was not now popular in 
France, and M. Guizot endured much obloquy 
for still adhering to this policy. Not satisfied 
with frustrating the convention of 1841, the 
French Chambers regretted the concessions of 
1831 and 1833. They inserted a paragraph in 
their reply to the Address from the throne, 
hoping that the Ministers would press negotia- 
tions for bringing the commerce of France exclu- 
sively under the surveillance of the national flag. 
The treaty of Washington, by which they supposed 



M. GUIZOT. — M. THIEES. 331 

that Lord Aberdeen had formally surrendered to 
America the right which was enforced against 
France, made them still more desirous of abro- 
gating the earlier treaties. With the annual 
resolution in favour of the nationality of Poland, 
they now began annually to pass their resolution 
in favour of the national flag of France. To those 
who are accustomed to the systematic working 
of the English Legislature, in which questions of 
foreign policy are invariably considered questions 
of confidence, this frequent interference of the 
French Chambers with the business of the admi- 
nistration, appears most unparliamentary. An 
English Ministry which should once be reminded 
of its duty by a vote of the House of Commons, 
would immediately retire. But representative 
government in France was of another kind ; and 
Sir Robert Peel and Lord Aberdeen made every 
allowance for the difficult circumstances in which 
M. Guizot was placed, and did all they fairly 
could to keep him in office. They felt that, 
although this statesman had many faults, and 
although his conduct in the last two years of his 
ministerial life proved him to be by no means 
worthy of that unlimited confidence and regard 
which he at this time received from England, 
yet he was more to be trusted than his political 
rival, M. Thiers, who had obviously no decided 



332 FOREIGN POLICY. 

principles, and was the mere mouthpiece of the 
French journalists. 

While this good understanding continued, and 
was every day more necessary for both Govern- 
ments, they moved harmoniously together, and 
their energy, instead of being spent in neutrali- 
sing the action of each other, was beneficially 
exerted for promoting good government in coun- 
tries to which their influence extended. In 1843, 
Greece and Spain, which might be considered 
both as the creations and the victims of France 
and England, were disturbed by rebellions that 
assumed the form of revolutions. The Regent, 
the Duke of Victory, was driven from power, 
and was obliged to seek an asylum in England. 
He was received here with the respect which was 
due to his character, and the sympathy which 
one who had been a true friend to our Govern- 
ment had a right to expect. The French press 
had long reproached our ministers for supporting 
Espartero ; but it will scarcely now be denied 
that in supporting him Lord Palmerston and 
Lord Aberdeen supported the best interests of 
Spain. Nevertheless, the King of the French 
and the Queen-mother, Maria Christina, rejoiced 
at his fall ; they thought now that the game was 
in their own hands; and these two devoted cham- 
pions of liberty and morality secretly exchanged 



KING OTHO. 333 

many hearty congratulations. They did not 
foresee that the fall of Espartero, who opposed 
their vile schemes, was an evil omen to them- 
selves and to their race. 

The bloodless revolution effected in Greece 
was in all respects harmless. King Otho was 
simply reminded of the constitution which had 
been promised to his subjects in 1833, and to 
which the modern Athenians had a most unques- 
tionable right ; he was also told that u it would 
be expedient " for him not to confine his friend- 
ship to his Bavarian countrymen who had fol- 
lowed him to Greece, and who, supported by the 
Russian ambassador, monopolised the honours of 
the new kingdom. Both Lord Palmerston and 
Lord Aberdeen have been much blamed for not 
insisting on the Greek constitution being carried 
earlier into effect. But the event showed whose 
fault it was that King Otho had not fulfilled his 
engagements. All monarchs who are honoured 
with the friendship of the Russian Autocrat, 
become singularly oblivious of their constitu- 
tional promises. As soon as the revolution had 
been accomplished, and his Greek Majesty had 
promised to comply with the wishes of his sub- 
jects, a vessel of war came to the Pirseus by the 
peremptory order of Nicholas, and conveyed the 
Russian ambassador from the classic shores. 



334 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Constitutional Greece thus lost the coun- 
tenance of the Emperor of Russia, but the con- 
duct of the King of Prussia in the same year 
was quite to his taste. The States of Posen also 
reminded Frederic William of the assurances 
they had received, and the institutions they had 
been promised in May 1815. The reply of the 
King of Prussia may stand for a model of des- 
potic dignity and royal reasoning. The address, 
he said, was highly irregular. He " entirely 
disapproved of its sentiments and proposals." 
He would enter into no explanations relating to 
the " indecorous allusion to the royal decree of 
May 1815, snch decree being not obligatory 
upon us." 

In the same spirit " the sovereign princes and 
free towns of Germany" sent, in the spring of 
1844, their plenipotentiaries to Yienna, and after 
having been harangued by Prince Metternich, 
passed resolutions against all evil-disposed persons 
who could think of dividing the regal power, or 
of appealing to the articles of the Treaty of 
Yienna. Both the general and separate trea- 
ties of that Congress, it was plainly declared, 
were to be interpreted by governments in the 
manner which might appear to them most ex- 
pedient. What would be said of individuals who 
should announce to the world that they had 
determined to construe their written obligations 



austkia's suicidal policy. 335 

in any form which might most suit their con- 
venience ? Have governments no shame ? If 
Prince Metternich had been that enlightened and 
profound statesman which one of his admirers 
in England has declared him to be, he would 
have seen that there were clouds in the Eastern 
horizon ominous of the time when Austria must 
either adopt a moderate constitutional policy, or 
consent to be for ever at the feet of Eussia. In 
1843, negotiations had been going on relating to 
the disputes between Russia and Turkey, on the 
insurrection in Servia ; by the deposition of one 
prince and the election of another, Eussia arro- 
gantly affirmed that Turkey had violated her 
treaties ; and the Emperor demanded the expul- 
sion of the new ruler, and the dismissal of his 
agents. Austria, in her eagerness to trample on 
the liberties of her own people, was gradually 
abandoning her old traditional policy. She as- 
serted that this dispute was not of European 
interest, that it might be left to be settled by 
Eussia and Turkey alone, that it was not of so 
much importance as to require the interposition 
of the great Powers. Lord Aberdeen thought 
that since Prince Metternich did not see the 
necessity for interference, it would be useless for 
the Western Powers to complicate relations, 
when there was no general concurrence on the 



336 FOREIGN POLICY. 

means to be employed. He has been lately much 
attacked for not seizing the occasion, and acting 
with more decision against Russia. But this 
was scarcely a direct attack on Turkey ; and the 
Emperor Nicholas had then no intention of 
pushing matters to an extremity. Austria was 
particularly interested in the state of Servia, 
and yet Austria remained passive. Lord Pal- 
merston, however, censured the government for 
the indifference which was displayed ; and Russia 
has certainly proved that any forbearance shown 
to he]* is likely to be misunderstood. 

When M. Guizot was assailed in the Chamber 
of Deputies for not rendering more efficient aid 
to Turkey on this Servian dispute, he defended 
himself as the English Ministers did, by pointing 
to the apathy of the Austrian Government. He 
said that he could not do otherwise than follow 
the example of Austria and England. But the 
Western Powers were not entirely quiescent ; 
without assuming a hostile attitude, they exerted 
their diplomacy in favour of Turkey. 

An incident occurred on an island of the 
Pacific, which for a moment threatened to com- 
promise the friendship of the French and English 
Governments. Great importance was attached 
to it at the time ; but now it is only worth re- 
calling as affording a conclusive proof that while 



SIR ROBERT PEEl/S POLICY. 337 

Lord Aberdeen was Secretary of State for Foreign 
Affairs, the Government was not influenced by 
that preposterous love of peace at any price with 
which this minister had been reproached. The 
policy of Sir Robert Peel's administration was 
essentially and avowedly pacific ; for the sake of 
peace they even made some sacrifices ; but to 
these sacrifices there was a limit. The Ministers 
were engaged in carrying out a great commer- 
cial experiment ; by their domestic policy they 
were diffusing content and happiness throughout 
the land, and conferring an inestimable boon on 
many future generations. Since it is certain 
that Free Trade would not have been established 
in a time of war, it is most inconsistent in those 
who approve of that commercial policy to blame 
their ministers for being anxious to avoid all 
causes of quarrel, and to conduct all affairs 
with other nations in the spirit of peace. When, 
however, a wrong was inflicted by a French 
admiral on a British subject, a missionary, who 
had performed the duties of a consul at Tahiti, 
redress was promptly demanded by Lord Aber- 
deen, and Sir Robert Peel spoke some strong 
and unmistakable words in the House of Com- 
mons : "A gross outrage, accompanied by a 
gross indignity, has been committed," said the 
Prime Minister ; and the indemnity required 

z 



338 FOKEIGN POLICY. 

from the French Government was immediately 
promised and speedily given. 

But the affairs of Otaheite had been the sub- 
ject of many discussions in the French and 
English Parliaments, before the news of the 
insult offered to Mr. Pritchard reached London. 
The Emperor Nicholas had watched the events 
in the Pacific. Not even to the English Opposi- 
tion was the calmness and moderation of Lord 
Aberdeen more displeasing than to his Imperial 
Majesty. He fondly hoped either that the 
French Chambers would compel M. Guizot to 
support the imprudent measures of Admiral 
Dupetit Thouars, or that Lord Aberdeen would 
be obliged by public opinion in England to 
demand concessions from the French Govern- 
ment which it could not honourably grant. In 
both desires he was disappointed. The liberal 
party in France inveighed against M. Guizot, 
and many politicians in England declaimed 
against Lord Aberdeen; but to retain the friend- 
ship of France without losing the confidence of 
Eussia was surely no contemptible diplomatic 
achievement, and this fact indicates more than 
volumes could express, the wisdom and dignity 
of Lord Aberdeen's policy in 1844. 

Yet this was the time when that engagement 
between the English Government and the Kussian 



RUSSIAN MEMORANDUM OF 1844. 339 

Emperor was entered into, which has been so 
much misunderstood, and so eagerly misrepre- 
sented. It was in the June of this year that Ni- 
cholas visited England. It was on conversations 
held with Sir Robert Peel and Lord Aberdeen 
during the brief sojourn of the Czar in this coun- 
try, that the celebrated Memorandum of Count 
Nesselrode was based. This document has lately 
been presented to Parliament by the command 
of Her Majesty ; it has been referred to by the 
official journal of St. Petersburg in justification 
of the recent attack on Turkey ; and the English 
Opposition, echoing in this respect the tone of 
the Czar's organ, have spoken of it as a secret 
Memorandum stipulating for the partition of the 
Ottoman Empire. In justice to the English 
minister it requires some consideration. 

The first thought that must strike an impar- 
tial person on attentively reading the document 
on which so much stress has been laid, is 
that it has an extremely innocent appearance. 
There may be evil in it, but it certainly does not 
show itself at the first glance. It would seem 
to be one of the most harmless, one of the most 
pacific, and one of the best intentioned of state 
papers. Beginning with the declaration that 
Russia and England are mutually convinced of 
the necessity of maintaining the Ottoman Porte 

z 2 



340 FOREIGN POLICY, 

in its independence and territorial possessions, 
as the best combination for the general interests 
of Europe, the Memorandum proceeds to affirm 
that Russia and England have therefore an equal 
interest in uniting to strengthen that empire, and 
to shield it from all dangers ; that it is absolutely 
necessary the Porte should be left in peace, and 
not be disturbed by diplomatic bickerings, or by 
uncalled-for interference in its internal affairs ; 
that as the Porte, counting on the jealousies 
among the states of Europe, has a constant ten- 
dency to escape from its engagements, it should 
not be confirmed in this delusion, but that all 
the great Powers should make common cause in 
seeing justice done to each other. That another 
complaint is the difficulty of reconciling the 
Sultan's sovereignty with the interests of the 
Christian population ; that the Ottoman ministers 
should be impressed with the importance of treat- 
ing the Christians with mildness; but that the 
representatives of the great Powers, while insist- 
ing on this truth, ought scrupulously to guard 
against any exclusive dictation, and exert all their 
influence to keep the Christians in obedience to the 
Sultan. That if this course be followed with mode- 
ration and calmness, it is likely to be successful, 
and all complications affecting the tranquillity of 
the Ottoman Empire may be avoided. That still it 



RUSSIAN MEMORANDUM OF 1844. 341 

is not to be concealed that this empire holds 
within itself many elements of dissolution ; and 
that unforeseen circumstances may hasten its fall, 
in spite of all the efforts of friendly cabinets to 
preserve it. That it is not given to human fore- 
sight to settle beforehand a plan of action for an 
unknown case ; but in the uncertainty impending 
over the future, one fundamental idea may admit 
of application: if Eussia and England, in the 
event of such a catastrophe, shall have come to a 
previous understanding as to a common course 
of action, the danger will be much diminished ; 
and the more so because that understanding will 
have the full assent of Austria, between whom 
and Eussia there was an entire conformity of 
principle. That the reason of this was very 
simple ; by land Eussia exerted over Turkey a 
preponderant action ; by sea England held the 
same position ; isolated action of these two 
Powers might do much mischief; united, it must 
produce a positive benefit. That this principle 
was agreed upon during the Emperor's last 
residence in London; and the result was the 
eventual engagements that if anything unfore- 
seen should occur in Turkey, England and 
Eussia would consult together on the measures 
they might take in common. That the object of 
the understanding was to uphold the Ottoman 

z 3 



342 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Empire in its present state as long as it could 
be upheld ; but if it should crumble to pieces, 
to enter into a previous concert on all matters 
relating to the establishment of a new order of 
things, and together to take care that the changes 
which must occur might not be detrimental to the 
rights and security of the two states, and to the 
balance of power. That as the policy of Austria 
is perfectly identified with that of Russia, if 
England were to act in concert with them, France 
must be obliged to follow in the course decided 
upon at St, Petersburg, London, and Vienna ; 
and a conflict between the great Powers be 
obviated, and peace maintained even in such 
serious circumstances. 

This is the Memorandum of June 1844, free 
as much as possible from mere diplomatic for- 
malities, and expressed in as plain English as the 
tortuous and uncouth phraseology of Count 
Nesselrode will allow. At best, however, some 
of the sentences are sufficiently vague, and op- 
posed to the idioms of our language. For the 
sake of truth and fairness it is well that it 
should be given entire, that every one may judge 
for himself whether the accusations founded 
upon it are just. Did Lord Aberdeen in admit- 
ting the correctness of this Memorandum agree 



CHARGES AGAINST LORD ABERDEEN. 343 

to the partition of the Ottoman Empire ? Does 
he stand confessed a traitor to the best interests 
of England, and in connivance for the worst of 
purposes with the Emperor of Russia ? These 
heavy charges have been publicly made by the 
Leader of Opposition in the House of Commons ; 
and he seemed quite unconscious of the position 
in which he placed both Lord Aberdeen and 
himself by giving them utterance. He made 
the accusation that Lord Aberdeen, in the highest 
post to which a British subject can aspire, was 
a deliberate traitor, and therefore guilty of the 
greatest crimes. Never in our parliamentary 
history was such a charge made by a leader of a 
party against the head of a government. It is 
not that Lord Aberdeen was a weak or a mis- 
taken minister; but that in his long political 
career he had committed, and was then habitually 
committing, high treason. He who made such 
assertions was bound, even though he stood 
alone in his opinion, to bring forward a motion 
of impeachment, or admit himself to be a calum- 
niator. No member of parliament, much less 
the leader of a great party, has a right to bandy 
such accusations about, and then shrink from 
bringing them to a definite issue. This is not 
political warfare. It is not a question of public 
principle, but of private honour. 

z 4 



344 FOREIGN POLICY. 

No individual, whether he be a member of 
parliament or a simple citizen, can declare his 
neighbour to be guilty of larceny or forgery, 
without being compelled to substantiate his asser- 
tions before a legal tribunal, or to make ample 
compensation to the object of his defamation. Is 
the moral responsibility of the public man who 
accuses a prime minister, not of inconsistency, 
not of want of judgment, not of laxness of prin- 
ciple, but of downright treachery, less than the 
legal responsibility of the citizen ? What is the 
magnitude of the crimes committed by the humble 
prisoners in our police courts and halls of justice, 
compared with that of the prime minister who 
betrays his sovereign and his country ? The 
member who, in his place in Parliament, even 
hints his suspicions of such base conduct, ought 
at once, whatever may be the party conveniences 
of the hour, to make his accusations good, or 
ever afterwards remain silent. The same charges 
which the leader of Opposition has brought 
against Lord Aberdeen, Mr. Urquhart brought 
against Lord Palmerston. But of Mr. Urquhart 
this may at least be said, that as soon as he had 
obtained a seat in Parliament, he did make a mo- 
tion for papers avowedly for the purpose of 
framing articles of impeachment. So much can- 
not be said for the Leader of Opposition, though 



CHARGES AGAINST LORD ABERDEEN. 345 

he was in a position of much greater responsi- 
bility, and ought surely to have had very strong 
evidence, amounting to much more than a moral 
conviction, before such charges ever passed his 
lips. When challenged by Mr. Gladstone to 
bring forward a vote of want of confidence, as, 
after what he had said, it was his especial duty 
to do, he only thought of replying by a quibble 
that he would move a vote of want of confidence 
in the Ministers as soon as they proved that they 
had any confidence in themselves. And this in 
a time of war ! What would be said of the ma- 
riner who, when his vessel was among the 
breakers, should declare that he would not 
remove a treacherous pilot from the helm, be- 
cause some of the crew were as much convinced 
as himself of the evil intentions of the man to 
whom the safety of the ship and the lives of all 
on board were entrusted? 

The Emperor of Russia had, doubtless, an ob- 
ject in coming to the understanding he did with 
Sir Robert Peel and Lord Aberdeen. He doubt- 
less thought that he had gained an important 
point in securing their adhesion to the plan of 
action which was then defined. To appreciate 
this document, like others emanating from the 
same source, it ought to be read backwards. 
Beginning with the last sentences instead of the 



346 FOREIGN POLICY. 

first, the design of the Memorandum is/at once 

seen. It is contained in the few words, (" If Eng- 

7 v © 

land, as the principal Maritime Power, acts in 
concert with Russia and Austria, it is to be sup- 
posed that France will find herself obliged to act 
\ in conformity with the course agreed upon be- \ 
1 tween St. Petersburg, London, and Vienna." J 
This is the key to the awful paper which r has 
f been said to be so diabolical in its object. (The 
reason why the Czar was so anxious that England 
should pledge herself not to act without consult- 
ing Russia in any Eastern conjuncture, was 
simply because he feared that the Western Powers 
might, some day, act without his consent or know- 
ledge, and that Russia might be left in that same 
state of isolation in which France had been placed 
through the perverseness of M. Thiers in 1840. 
The events of that year had made a deep impres- 
sion on the mind of the Emperor. The alliance 
of France and England, which seemed, notwith- 
standing any occasional differences, to become 
more natural and more systematic every day, 
was to him a constant cause of apprehension. He 
did not doubt that the two nations could effectu- 
ally prevent his influence from being predomi- 
nant in Turkey, and paralyse, even in the moment ~\ 
of action, the movement of his fleets and armies^/ 
The vigour and rapidity with which England 



347 

had at last decided the fate of the Pasha of Egypt, 
whose power had long appeared so menacing, 
inspired even the proud Autocrat with some fears 
for his own future ; and he dreaded that, should 
the forces of France and England be once com- 
bined, and skilfully directed against himself, his 
destiny might not be very different from that of 
Mehemet Ali. 

In his northern capital he eagerly lent his ear 
to his dependents, who assured him that after 
the humiliation France had suffered at the hands 
of England in 1840, the two countries could 
never again be sincere allies. Lord Aberdeen 
had not, however, been long in office, when, to 
the alarm of Nicholas, he made use of the words 
u entente cordiale" as expressive of the relations 
of the two Governments. Nor was this a mere 
diplomatic phrase ; it was an undeniable fact, of 
which the political events of the last three years 
had afforded abundant evidence. This under- 
standing had for its principle a just respect for 
the rights of all nations, and originated in the \ 
esteem and confidence with which M. Guizot and \ 
Lord Aberdeen were mutually inspired. The \ 
influence which the English minister thus ac- 
quired in French councils could be the cause of 
no jealousy to other states ; for it was exercised 
for the general welfare of Europe, and wa^s 



348 FOREIGN POLICY. 

cordially approved by Prussia and Austria. It 
depended upon no treaty. In it there was 
nothing exclusive. The friendship of these two 
eminent statesmen gave it all its life and vigour. 
Yet all this time the French press was inveighing 
against the ambition of Russia, and inculcating the 
duty of opposing all the attempts of the Czar to 
establish his dominion in Turkey. Pacific as was 
the policy of M. Guizot, it could not be concealed 
from Nicholas that the French Government was 
even then proceeding in its career of conquest in 
Africa, and that the French fleet, under the com- 
mand of the Prince de Joinville, was performing 
some very brilliant actions. The jealousy of 
England had not been roused, even by the bom- 
bardment of Mogador. An English squadron 
watched these operations in the Mediterranean ; 
but the English Ministry showed not the least 
intention of making the war a cause of quarrel 
between the two nations. It was evident that 
the French people looked to the conquest of Al- 
giers as the basis of still greater operations. It 
was evident that the state of the Ottoman Empire 
and the policy of Russia in the East had some- 
thing to do with the determination of France to 
maintain her hold, at all hazards, on Algiers. 
The Emperor of Russia also knew that the 
government of the King of the French, obeying 



lord Aberdeen's policy. 349 

the impulse of the nation, was ready, had not 
Austria and England held back, to have made 
even the Servian quarrel a case for intervention. 
There could be no doubt that if England should 
unite with her, France would be prepared at 
any time to oppose Russia in the East. How 
was this danger to be prevented ? How was it 
possible to hinder the Western Powers from 
coming to some secret arrangement to rescue 
Turkey ? 

One course, and only one course, was open. 
Without England, France could do nothing. 
Unsupported by England, the naval power of 
France was scarcely equal to that of Russia. 
Alone, it was evident that France never could 
make the Eastern difficulty a cause of war, and 
that Russia, both by land and sea, would be more 
than a match for all the forces which France 
might bring, either into the Baltic or the Euxine. 
It was therefore necessary to make any pledge to 
England, in order to bind her in return not to 
take any decisive resolution on the affairs of 
Turkey, without consulting Russia. With this 
object, the Emperor Nicholas arrived in London, . 
professed his anxiety to maintain the Ottoman 
Umpire, relinquished all exclusive views of 1 
aggrandisement, promised to abstain from any ( 
interference in Turkey, and to take no steps in 



350 FOREIGN POLICY. 

the East without previously asking the opinion 
of the English Government. 

Did Lord Aberdeen act rightly in consenting 
to such engagement ? This question may unhe- 
sitatingly be answered in the affirmative ; and 
it may also be confidently added, that any other 
minister would have agreed to the same terms, 
Had Lord Palmerston been in the Foreign Office 
at the time, he would have acted in the same 
manner. As in 1841 he thought it much to gain 
the assent of Russia to the convention by which 
her exclusive pretensions to Turkey were given 
up, so in 1844 he would have considered that an 
engagement by which the Emperor of Russia 
agreed to do nothing in the East without first 
communicating his intentions to the English 
Ministers, declared that the integrity and the 
independence of the Porte should be respected, 
not only renounced for himself, but for all the 
princes of Europe, any right, as Christian rulers, 
to dictate to the Porte for the advantage of its 
Christian subjects, and promised not to harass 
the Sultan by diplomatic bickerings and per- 
petual interference, was in the same spirit as the 
recent treaty, and provided for the tranquillity 
of the Ottoman Empire, 

The only sentence in the Memorandum to 
which any objection can be made, is that in 



NICHOLAS' WANT OF HONOUR. 351 

which it is stated that France would be compelled 
to adopt the same measures as the other Powers 
of Europe. But it is right to remember that 
this passage was not written by Lord Aberdeen, 
but by Count Nesselrode; and that though it 
was plainly the intention of the Kussian minister 
to continue the isolation of France in her Eastern 
policy, yet the English Government was on the 
best of terms with that of France, and was not 
by this agreement obliged to consent to anything 
of which France might disapprove. Under any 
circumstances it was extremely unlikely that 
England would come to any final decision on the 
aifairs of Turkey without endeavouring to obtain 
the concurrence of France in the same resolu- 
tions ; and as the tenor of the Memorandum 
was immediately communicated to M. Guizot, 
and as the relations between the two Governments 
increased rather than diminished in cordiality, it 
is obvious that this document was understood to 
mean, what Lord Aberdeen believed it to be, 
a positive engagement on the part of Russia, 
all the more stringent because it was not in the 
form of a treaty, never to encroach on the power 
of the Sultan, nor to do anything affecting Turkey 
without the knowledge of England. 

By what process of reasoning the Emperor of 
Russia should have lately indicated this Memo- 



352 FOREIGN POLICY. 

randum of Nesselrode as a justification of his 
conduct, and as a proof of Lord Aberdeen's 
participation in his schemes, it is impossible to 
conceive. The paper declares, on the word of a 
sovereign, his desire for the maintenance of the 
Ottoman Empire ; the Emperor Nicholas avow- 
edly has attempted to overthrow the power of 
the Sultan, and his quarrel with England arose 
simply from the fact of her believing that Turkey 
had still a strong principle of life within her. 
The paper stipulates that no Power, nor all 
the Powers together, should interfere with the 
sovereign rights of the Sultan ; the Emperor 
Nicholas declared war against the Porte, because 
it would not consent to hand over to himself the 
allegiance of all the Greek Christians in Turkey. 
The paper stipulates that Russia should do 
nothing in Turkey without the knowledge of 
England ; the Emperor Nicholas not only neg- 
lected to inform the English Ministers of what 
his real intentions were, but gave them assu- 
rances which were directly contradicted by facts, 
and spoke of nothing but peace to our ambas- 
sador, while the conduct of his agent in Turkey, 
and his acts on the frontier, breathed nothing 
but war. The Memorandum, instead of proving 
Lord Aberdeen's complicity, only proves the 
Czar's own want of honour and good faith ; just 



lord Aberdeen's policy. 353 

as the protocol of 1826 spoke of peace, when 
Russia only intended war, so the Autocrat con- 
strued his engagement to support the integrity 
of Turkey, to mean the partition of the Ottoman 
Empire. And there are politicians in England, 
who, judging of others by themselves, and adopt- 
ing the Czar's notions of morality and honour, 
while professedly opposing his policy, are ready 
to join in the same interpretations of treaties 
and state documents. 

On the morning of the 6th of October, three 
months after the visit of the Emperor of Russia, 
the King of the French landed at Portsmouth, 
and was most enthusiastically received by the 
government and the nation. The arrival of 
Louis Philippe in England was regarded as a 
pledge of future peace ; and the harmony of the 
two kingdoms was not at any time interrupted. 
They might take different views of the state of 
affairs in Spain and Greece, but there was no 
open antagonism such as there had been some 
years earlier, and was again to be some months 
later. At length another convention for the 
suppression of the slave trade was agreed upon, 
and the irritability of the French nation was 
soothed by the concessions which Lord Aberdeen 
made to their flag. 

Even in America, France and England main- 

A A 



354 FOKEIGN POLICY. 

tained a common action, and, much to the indig- 
nation of some American politicians, ventured to 
question the pretensions they put forth to decide 
all disputes according to their interests, and 
without regard to the opinions of those European 
governments, which, having territories on the 
American continent, had a right to an opinion 
even on questions of transatlantic policy. The 
assertion of the doctrine of Mr. Munroe may 
one day involve the United States in a war with 
the whole of Europe. The inaugural address of 
Mr. President Polk has the same tenor as 
certain declarations made by the Emperor 
Nicholas of Russia. The great Republic of 
America and the great despotism of Northern 
Europe have many points of resemblance. Some 
American rulers have made similar pretensions, 
and had not wiser counsels prevailed in 1846, 
and had not a statesman of so much moderation 
as Lord Aberdeen been in the Foreign Office of 
England, the aspiring republicans might have 
suffered the same fate as that which is impend- 
ing over the proud Autocrat. 

As soon as the ratifications of the treaty of 
Washington were exchanged, Mr. Fox, the repre- 
sentative of England, informed the American 
Government that, by the command of Lord Aber- 
deen, he was ready to commence negotiations for 



lord Aberdeen's policy. 355 

settling the boundary to the west of the Rocky 
Mountains. This question had long been a 
subject of controversy. In 1818, 1822, and 1826, 
Lord Castlereagh and Mr. Canning had both 
endeavoured to decide the claims of their govern- 
ments to the territories of Oregon : a temporary 
arrangement had been made in 1818, and in 1827 
was continued for an indefinite period ; but the 
respective rights of England and the United States 
to Oregon still remained undetermined. Lord 
Aberdeen did wisely in attempting a final settle- 
ment of the dispute. To leave such questions 
open for so many years, and to suffer them to 
recur from time to time in a more formidable 
form, was a policy not creditable to statesmen. 
Years, however, slipped away from the time when 
Lord Aberdeen's despatch to Mr. Fox was sent 
across the Atlantic ; one President of the United 
States succeeded another, and negotiation fol- 
lowed negotiation, but the difficulty still re- 
mained, and became greater than ever. 

To enter into any detail of the arguments on 
either side would now be useless. The neigh- 
bouring regions were not then of so much value 
as they have become since the discovery of gold 
in California. The navigation of the river 
Columbia, Vancouver's Island, and the harbours 
on the shores of the Pacific, might seem of import- 

A A 2 



356 FOREIGN POLICY. 

ance to the future of a great nation ; but all the 
natural, commercial, aftd political advantages of 
the whole Oregon territory would have been 
dearly purchased by a war between the North 
American republic and Great Britain. It must 
have checked the developement of the United 
States for half a century. 

But there were no apprehensions of war while 
the negotiations were going on between Mr. Pa- 
kenham and Mr. Calhoun. Lord Aberdeen's 
proposals were declined, his offer of arbitration 
was also rejected. Still, though the English 
minister thought the rights of his government 
incontestable, and though the American minister 
considered the claims of the United States equally 
unquestionable, no angry feeling had yet been 
engendered in the course of the discussion. It 
was only on the delivery of Mr. President Polk's 
inaugural address that the business became 
serious. The new President, in this political 
effusion, after alluding to his youth and inexpe- 
erince, fervently invoked " the aid of Almighty 
Providence " to guard the country from the mis- 
chiefs which might proceed from " an unwise 
policy " : and the first year of Mr. Polk's admi- 
nistration showed that there was only too much 
reason for such an invocation. He told his fellow- 
citizens that their title to the whole territory of 



lord Aberdeen's policy. 357 

Oregon was " clear and unquestionable," and 
that he considered it his duty to uphold their 
right. This address was delivered on the 3rd of 
March, 1845, and before the end of the month 
was perused with astonishment in England. The 
President's words were justly regarded as threat- 
ening; and politicians of all parties expressed 
their determination not to submit to such unbe- 
coming language. Lord Aberdeen, in the House 
of Lords, said in answer to Lord Clarendon, amid 
cheers from all sides of the House: "With the 
most anxious desire for peace, I still trust that 
this question may be amicably settled ; but if 
not, we possess rights ' clear and unquestionable,' 
which, by the blessing of God, and the support 
of Parliament, the Government is prepared to 
maintain." 

This is not the declaration of a minister ready 
to accept peace at any price, as Lord Aberdeen 
has sometimes been represented. Lord Palmer- 
ston never took up a more decided position, 
than Lord Aberdeen, on both the subjects of 
Tahiti and of Oregon, in these five years of 
office, deliberately assumed. 

As an illustration of the spirit in which Foreign 
Affairs were conducted, this Oregon question pos- 
sesses much interest ; but in other respects it is 
now of little importance. The honour of the 

A A 3 



358 FOREIGN POLICY. 

settlement belongs exclusively to Lord Aberdeen. 
The suggestion of the compromise was his last 
great act as Foreign Secretary. It was while the 
administration of Sir Robert Peel held office 
until Lord John Russell had formed his cabinet, 
that the news of the acceptance of the proposals 
by the American Government reached England. 
These northern boundaries were now settled, 
and every difficulty from this cause removed. 
Thus, what had so long perplexed Lord Castle- 
reagh, Mr. Canning, and even Lord Palmerston, 
was now happily concluded ; and it may be 
doubted whether any statesman but Lord Aber- 
deen could, after so much bad feeling had arisen, 
have preserved peace between the two nations, 
so jealous of each other, and yet so eternally 
associated, without sacrificing the honour or the 
interest of either. It was a worthy conclusion of 
his career as Foreign Minister ; a career which, 
if it be not distinguished by great combinations, 
energetic action, or unrivalled brilliancy, if it 
be not of the kind which charms the imagination, 
dazzles the eye, or leads the understanding 
captive, has much in it that deserves the appro- 
bation of his countrymen, as standing for the 
model of a quiet, dignified, and pacific policy, 
offending no national prejudices, engendering no 
fierce heart-burnings, making no inveterate 



LOKD ABERDEEN'S POLICY. 359 

enemies ; but conciliating allies, maintaining a 
steady neutrality amid the angry contentions 
of an age, divided as no other age was ever 
divided, between mad rulers and mad subjects, 
and being at once just and friendly to the 
humblest as well as to the greatest states of 
the world. 

To be popular with the politicans of taverns 
and vestries has never been the ambition of this 
statesman. He has disdained to flatter the national 
pride ; he has never ministered to the vanity at 
the expense of the interests of Englishmen. A less 
apathetic temperament, with greater sympathy 
for the suffering multitudes of Europe, and a 
more apparent hatred of oppression, such as the 
noblest and wisest of Liberal Conservative states- 
men, Edmund Burke, possessed, may sometimes 
seem desirable in the ideal portrait of an English 
minister. But Lord Aberdeen must be taken as 
he is. He has the proud consciousness of never 
having expressed a sentiment he did not feel, and 
of never having stooped to buy popularity at 
the price of his self-respect. His name will be 
remembered with gratitude by the people when 
many popular favourites and all his malignant 
enemies shall be forgotten. It will be well for 
England if she never shall have a Foreign Secre- 
tary less sincere and upright than Lord Aberdeen. 

A A 4 



360 



CHAP. XL 

INTRIGUE. LORD PALMERSTON AGAIN FOREIGN MINISTER.— 

SPANISH MARRIAGES. IDENTITY OF THE POLICIES OF 

LORD ABERDEEN AND LORD PALMERSTON ON THIS QUES- 
TION. M. GUIZOT. — ANNEXATION OF CRACOW DIS- 
CUSSION IN THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. CONCURRENCE OF 

OPINION AN APOLOGIST FOR THE PARTITION OF POLAND. 

PORTUGAL AND SWITZERLAND. — POLITICAL MOVEMENTS 

IN ITALY. — MISSION OF LORD MINTO. CLOSE OF 1847. 

When Sir Robert Peel's Government resigned 
in the December of 1845, and Lord John Russell 
attempted to construct a Whig Cabinet, the 
question of the Corn Laws was not, as the public 
soon learnt, the only difficulty which the new 
Prime Minister had to meet. It appeared that 
there was at least one hereditary Whig statesman 
who could not appreciate the value of Lord Pal- 
merston's claims to be once more Foreign Secre- 
tary, and who set about resisting his pretensions. 
The son of the great prime minister of the 
great Reform Cabinet could not of course suppose 
that he would ever be excluded from a Liberal 
Ministry. It seemed impossible to do without 



POLITICAL INTBIGUES. 361 

Lord Grey ; but very easy to do without Lord 
Palmerston. This singular delusion was per- 
sisted in, and Lord John Russell found himself 
obliged to relinquish the task which he had con- 
scientiously undertaken. 

This failure, had it not been for the intrigue 
against one who had shown so much ability both 
in office and in opposition, and whose only crimes 
were his success and his patriotism, was not 
much to be regretted. It was better that Sir 
Eobert Peel should again return to office and 
complete the work he had begun. But the effect 
of Lord Grey's opposition to Lord Palmerston's 
resumption of the duties of Foreign Minister did 
not end with the political abortion of December 
1845. It was known abroad that it was on 
account of Lord Palmerston's sentiments and 
conduct with regard to France that one of the 
noblemen of the Whig party had thus questioned 
the propriety of the appointment. The King of 
the French and his ministers could not but agree 
with Lord Grey ; thus when Lord Palmerston 
did again become Foreign Minister, some months 
later, notwithstanding that he had in the interval 
visited Paris, and done all he could to remove 
this unfavourable impression from the minds of 
the rulers of France, he found, from no fault of 
his own, his relations with that Government seri- 



362 FOREIGN POLICY. 

ously complicated. Experience alone could teach 
some great Whig politicians the value and the 
importance of the statesman who honoured them 
by adhering to their party, and throwing the 
weight of his ability and popularity into their 
political scale, They did not know that the 
people of England, when forming their judgment 
on foreign policy, are not partisans ; that all they 
require is patriotism, courage, and sagacity ; and 
that they will always stand by the minister who 
will stand by the country. 

When Lord Palmerston retired from office in 
1841, France and England were vigorously en- 
gaged in thwarting each other in Spain. England 
indeed had no other object than the success of 
that constitutional system which she had so 
powerfully contributed to establish ; and our 
minister therefore only supported that Spanish 
political party which he considered best able 
and most willing to carry out the principles of 
good government. The soundness of Lord Pal- 
merston's views have been justified by time and 
experience. No person who knows anything 
of the Peninsula will now deny that the Pro- 
gresista party is by far the purest and the most 
honest of the sections into which the Spanish 
nation is divided. The Moderados, who enjoyed 
the patronage of France, were in fact the mere 



SPANISH MARRIAGES. 363 

instruments of the Queen Mother, Maria Chris- 
tina ; she was really the head of this faction, 
and by such a leader the followers may be 
judged. There were doubtless some men 
amongst them of virtue and talent ; but for the 
most part they were a mere cabal of greedy, 
corrupt, and unprincipled politicians. As such 
they were the fittest for carrying out the schemes 
for the aggrandisement of his family, which, the 
longer the King of the French remained on the 
throne, he with miserly prudence the more 
restlessly pursued. While Espartero remained 
in power, the fear that England might carry off 
the prize he thought so captivating, and marry 
the young Queen of Spain and the Infanta to 
princes of her own choosing, rendered Louis 
Philippe anxious to consent to a compromise. At 
first M. Guizot assured Lord Aberdeen of the will- 
ingness of the French Government to co-operate 
with England to effect the two marriages. But 
one reservation was included in the offers which 
France made. So early as in 1842 she informed 
the Governments interested in this question, that 
she would not consent to any prince but one of 
the House of Bourbon marrying the Queen of 
Spain, 

This was a somewhat extraordinary position 
for a constitutional government, such as that 



364 FOREIGN POLICY. 

of the King of the French, to take on a 
question relating to an independent kingdom. 
It was a revival of the doctrine of legiti- 
macy, and a revival of the pretensions of the 
French Bourbons to control the affairs of 
Spain. To this principle, as an abstract propo- 
sition, no English minister could consent. The 
French Government, to be sure, professed great 
respect for the independence of Spain, and for 
the free choice of the young Queen. But M. 
Guizot thought that they might be reconciled to 
such a limitation. What would be said in private 
life of the father of a large family, who should 
declare his great consideration for the personal 
independence of a young heiress, and yet in- 
sist on her marrying one of his family ? It 
was never asserted, when the declaration was 
made, that the Queen of Spain had any peculiar 
predilection for the descendants of Philip the 
Fifth ; and such a condition as that proposed by 
King Louis Philippe was absolutely unwarrant- 
able. Yet as a fact indicative of the spirit in 
which these negotiations were conducted by the 
French Government, this imperious announce- 
ment deserves attention. It shows the dif- 
ferent relations in which France and England 
stood, and accounts for much that subsequently 
occurred. 



SPANISH MARRIAGES. 365 

England did not in any manner attempt to 
influence the choice of the Spanish Court. Yet, 
surely, if any Government had an excuse for 
interfering with the marriage of the Queen of 
Spain, it was that of England ; for had it not 
been for England, the Queen of Spain might 
never have worn the diadem. Lord Palmerston 
had exposed himself to much obloquy, and even 
put to hazard his own position in the English 
Cabinet, for the purpose of supporting the 
constitutional cause in Spain. When France 
hung back, he still persevered. What right, 
then, had France, which England had not, to 
dictate on the question of the marriage of the 
Spanish Queen ? Such a pretension might have 
been intelligible in the government of Charles 
the Tenth; but it was treason against all con- 
stitutional principles when put forward by the 
ministers of Louis Philippe. 

In 1846, it was the object of M. Guizot to 
make out that there was a marked difference 
between the policy of Lord Aberdeen and Lord 
Palmerston on these Spanish Marriages. He 
wished to imply that the secretary of the Peel 
Government fully admitted the principle that 
none but a Bourbon should aspire to the hand 
of the Queen ; and that it was only when the 
Whig minister returned to power, that any dim- 



366 FOREIGN POLICY. 

culty arose. But this is most incorrect. Lord 
Aberdeen's opinion on that point was precisely 
the same as Lord Palmerston's ; to every 
Englishman it must be obvious that it could not 
be otherwise. For some time after this notifica- 
tion of M. Guizot, Lord Aberdeen, according 
even to the acknowledgment of the French 
Government, was most reserved. Though he 
had not opposed the French policy, it was not 
until the visit of Her Majesty to King Louis 
Philippe at Eu, in the September of 1843, that 
the ministers of the two nations came to any 
satisfactory understanding. That was a time 
of great festivity. Louis Philippe did all he 
could to entertain his illustrious guest : there 
were grand pic-nics in a truly royal style ; 
there were reviews ; there were balls ; but, 
amid all this rejoicing and magnificence, which 
served to fill the columns of newspapers, and 
gratify the curiosity of the multitudes on 
both sides of the Channel, the King had a 
keen eye to business ; and the great topic of 
conversation in the royal circle was the Spanish 
marriages. The common opinion is, that it 
was decided between the Foreign Secretaries 
of the two Governments, that France should 
abstain from proposing one of the sons of the 
King for the hand of the Queen of Spain, and 



SPANISH MARKIAGES. 367 

that England should not put forward a prince of 
the House of Coburg. But when the French 
Government declared its intention of confirming 
the choice of the Queen to the Bourbon family, 
it also voluntarily pledged itself to exclude the 
French princes from the candidateship. On 
that subject, then, there could be no further 
engagement. Lord Aberdeen only promised not 
to do, what he never had any intention of doing : 
he never intended to force a Prince of Coburg 
on the Spanish nation as the consort of their 
Queen ; and it was easy for him to say, that if 
such a prince were proposed, he would not 
receive the support of England. As it was im- 
possible for him to answer for the actions of 
other people, and especially for the conduct of 
such an impulsive personage as the Queen 
Mother, beyond this he could not go, 

It was Maria Christina, and not any English 
minister who caused the Prince of Coburg to be 
seriously regarded as a candidate. She cordially 
hated her two nephews with that passionate 
hatred which only relations can feel for one 
another. Her first wish was that the Queen 
should have for her husband one of the sons of 
King Louis Philippe. When she was with diffi- 
culty made to comprehend the impossibility of 
gratifying this desire, she began, with the same 



368 FOREIGN POLICY. 

importunity to demand the Prince of Coburg. 
Louis Philippe took the alarm. The match- 
making propensities of these two kindred 
spirits were fully aroused. Lord Aberdeen's 
conduct was scrupulously just, without being 
so favourable to the partizans of France as M. 
Guizot represented it, when he attempted to 
make out a case against Lord Palmerston, in 
order to justify the miserable trickery for which 
this French statesman and philosopher must be 
held responsible. On the one hand Lord Aber- 
deen positively prohibited the English am- 
bassador from taking any steps to advance the 
pretensions of the Prince of Coburg in oppo- 
sition • to France ; and on the other, he assured 
the Spanish minister that though Spain had 
strong reasons for choosing a consort for their 
sovereign from the Bourbon family, yet, should 
the Spanish Government and the Spanish Queen 
decide otherwise, they might count on the sym- 
pathy and support of England against any at- 
tempts that France might make to interfere with 
their independence. This is surely not adopting 
the views of France, nor did M. Guizot, in 1845, 
think so, whatever he might say in 1846 and 
1847. The facts can speak for themselves. 

In the September of 1845, Queen Victoria, 
when returning from Germany, paid the King of 



SPANISH MATCRIAGES. 369 

the French a short visit. When she appeared off 
Treport, the water was very low ; and all her 
good subjects were much amused on learning 
that she was convej^ed to land in that apparently 
unkingly vehicle, a bathing machine. The mar- 
riages of the Queen of Spain and the Infanta 
were again discussed, and Lord Aberdeen and 
M. Guizot again arrived at a conclusion. Ano- 
ther positive promise was made by the French 
minister ; the fear lest the Prince of Coburg 
should obtain the support of England, caused 
the King and his Foreign Secretary to pledge 
themselves that in the event of the Duke of 
Montpensier being the accepted suitor of the 
Infanta, their marriage should not take place 
until 'all danger of the two crowns of France 
and Spain being united in the family of Orleans 
had been obviated by the birth of an heir to the 
throne. The conference of the two statesmen 
was most friendly; Lord Aberdeen was frank 
and sincere ; from that time all reasonable sus- 
picion of England acting contrary to the wishes 
of France, had King Louis Philippe really desired 
to pursue a fair and honourable policy, ought to 
have been set at rest. To prove that Lord Pal- 
merston was the aggressor, and M. Guizot on the 
defensive, when the final resolution of breaking 
faith with England was taken, it would be neces- 

B B 



370 FOREIGN POLICY. 

sary to show that from this second visit of her 
Majesty to Eu until the moment when Lord 
Palmerston again became Foreign Minister, the 
relations of the French Government with Lord 
Aberdeen had been perfectly cordial. 

Instead of this being the case, a very short 
time after the consultation and understanding, 
M. Guizot's suspicions were again awakened by 
his agent, and Lord Aberdeen was distinctly in- 
formed by the French ambassador, that if the 
name of Prince Leopold of Saxe Coburg con- 
tinued to be mentioned in Spain as that of one 
of the candidates for the hand of either of the 
Spanish princesses, France would consider her- 
self free from the obligations she had contracted 
to England, and would press the marriage of the 
Duke of Montpensier with the Queen. Nor did 
M. Guizot confine himself to words. Lord 
Aberdeen assured him that he might make his 
mind easy, for that England had no wish to 
propose the Prince of Coburg. The French 
minister, in direct violation of his engagement 
with England, and while Lord Aberdeen was 
yet in power, sent positive instructions to M. 
Bresson to propose the Duke of Montpensier as the 
husband of the Queen or of the Infanta.* After 

* M. Guizot to M. De St. Aulaire, Feb. 1846. M. 
Guizot's own words, when defending himself in the Cham- 



SPANISH MARRIAGES. 371 

this it was surely unworthy of M. Guizot to say 
that Lord Palmerston was the cause of the sub- 
sequent rupture. The French Government, in 
their blind eagerness to turn the two marriages 
to the account of their sovereign, were evidently, 
according to their own despatches, as distrustful 
of Lord Aberdeen as of his successor. 

The objections made by M. Guizot to Lord 
Palmerston's conduct were most frivolous. The 
English statesman, it appeared, was to be 
blamed because he did not inform the elec- 
tors of Tiverton, on his re-elections, who 
should marry the two Spanish princesses ; be- 
cause he took a month after entering office to 
consider the question; and because, in his 

ber of Peers in the session of 1847, are enough to prove 
his duplicity, and that, six months before Lord Palmerston 
returned to office, he had resolved, if he could not have 
altogether his own way, of breaking with England. 
" Shortly afterwards," said he, " the name of the Prince 
of Coburg having been put forward by an eminent person 
in Spain, I felt alarmed, and wrote to Lord Aberdeen, 
who replied that I might rest perfectly reassured, and that 
I had nothing to fear on that side. M. Bresson, however 
insisting that an intrigue was on foot to favour a Coburo- 
candidate, I wrote to him on the 10th of December, 1845, to 
be on his guard, and as the arrangement was contrary to the 
doctrine maintained throughout the affair by France, to 
defeat the pretensions of the Prince of Coburg, by all the 
means in his power, and to propose the Duke of Montpensier 
either for the hand of the Queen or the Infanta,'''' 

b b 2 



372 FOREIGN POLICY. 

despatch of the 19th of July, he made mention 
of " a Coburg the more and of France the less," 
All this is very pitiable. To come from the 
mouth of a statesman acquainted with England, 
with public opinion in this country, and with 
the personal character of our public men, it was 
indeed paltry and ridiculous. Had Lord Pal- 
merston been inclined to act as M. Guizot sus- 
pected him of doing, he never would have had 
a single defender in Parliament nor in his own 
Cabinet. From the merest selfishness, if from 
no higher motive, he would have hesitated be- 
fore committing himself to such a policy. But 
Lord Palmerston, as everybody in England 
knows well, was incapable of acting in that 
perfidious manner. Whatever his faults may 
have been while Foreign Minister, such petty 
intrigue, falsehood, and trickery as M. Guizot 
imputed to him, are not in his nature. He may 
have had too little regard for the feelings of 
foreign governments ; he may in his despatches 
have told them disagreeable truths in a dis- 
agreeable manner ; but his most relentless ene- 
mies have generally admitted that in the whole 
course of his extended political career, he has 
been eminently manly, frank, and true. 

To go into an examination of the arguments 
M. Guizot was driven to use in his attempt to 



SPANISH MARRIAGES. 373 

excuse his conduct ; to inquire whether he was 
at liberty to give to an English Ambassador 
one day, a positive assurance, which Avas directly 
contradicted by his acts of the next ; to recount 
all the shuffling, recrimination, and deceit which 
these unfortunate marriages engendered, would 
be now superfluous. The reason revolts, and 
the heart sickens, at the mere consideration of 
such excuses. That they should have been 
made by a great philosopher called in an en- 
lightened age from the professor's chair to go- 
vern a great kingdom ; that they should have 
been made by the great exponent and historian 
of civilisation, is perhaps the most humiliating 
spectacle of the degradation of genius and phi- 
losophy since Lord Bacon was sentenced for 
corruption on the seat of judgment. 

The means employed by the French Govern- 
ment to induce the Spanish Court and Ministry 
to act in complete subservience to the views of 
King Louis Philippe, were the simplest in the 
world. Of the two sons of Don Francisco de 
Paula, Don Enrique was considered the most 
capable ; for this reason he was less approved of 
than the other by France, as the future consort 
of the young and inexperienced Queen. Both 
Lord Aberdeen and Lord Palmerston had given 
the preference to Don Enrique ; and M. Guizot 

B B 3 



374 FOREIGN POLICY. 

made a show of inviting Lord Aberdeen to 
unite with France, in recommending his pre- 
tensions. The Moderado party and Queen 
Christina were then omnipotent at the Spanish 
Court ; but Don Enrique had placed himself at 
the head of the Progresistas ; and his success 
would probably bring about a change of govern- 
ment. Letters were shown by M. Bresson, the 
representative of the French Government to the 
Queen Mother, and to the Moderado ministers, 
implying that France and England had now 
agreed to support Don Enrique. The resolution 
of the Queen Mother and her political friends 
was soon taken. They determined, as M. Bres- 
son well knew they would, to marry the Queen 
to the rival brother ; and to prevent Don En- 
rique being proposed for the hand of the Infanta, 
made it a condition, as M. Bresson well knew 
they would, that the marriage of the Infanta 
with the Duke of Montpensier should be solem- 
nised at the same time. Thus was this game of 
perfidy and intrigue played out. M. Guizot 
blamed Lord Palmerston for even mentioning 
the name of the Prince of Coburg, and still, 
with much inconsistency, represented himself 
as yielding to the importunities of the Queen 
Mother.* 

* Lord Aberdeen's private letter to M. Guizot, dated the 



SPANISH ^MARRIAGES. 375 



# It was on the night of the 28th of August, 
1846, when the peaceful citizens of Madrid were 
wrapped in their slumbers, that, in the midst of 
a midnight orgie, the consent of the young 
Queen was wrung from her ; and the official 
gazette announced the next day, to the astonish- 
ment of all her subjects, that Her Majesty had 
decided on marrying her cousin, Don Francisco. 
M. Bresson, in answer to Lord Palmerston's 
statement, denied that there was any orgie, or 
that he had taken any part in forcing the con- 
sent of the Queen. Now, it may be true that 
the French diplomatist never left his own house 
during that eventful night ; but it is no less 
true, that he left a very efficient agent at the 
palace, Maria Christina, who was both able and 
willing to do and say all that might be neces- 
sary. Lord Palmerston had good authority 
for what he said; nor, when it is remembered 



16th of September, 1846, and published in the twenty- first 
number of the il Revue Retrospective" is an unanswerable 
proof of the identity of his policy with that of Lord Pal- 
merston's in the Spanish marriages. Lord Aberdeen 
declares that he might have done exactly as Lord Palmerston 
did, in mentioning the Prince of Coburg's name, and that 
after all that had been said and written, he could see no 
difference on the question between Sir Robert Peel's Govern- 
ment and the succeeding ministry, — Revue Retrospective^ 
No. 21. p. 324. 

B B 4 



376 FOREIGN SPLICY. 

what scenes have since been witnessed at micU 
night within the same palace walls, is this orgie 
at all improbable. M. Bresson's assertion will 
not go for much ; night and darkness, and re- 
velry were the fitting accessories of that deed 
which blackened the fair fame of a great philo- 
sophical statesman, sacrificed the welfare of 
Spain, made more than one diadem tremble on 
the head of its wearer, and discredited the cause 
of constitutional freedom throughout the world. 
From the time when the announcement of the 
intended marriages arrived in London, the close 
friendship and alliance which had united England 
with the Orleans dynasty was broken for ever. 
From that time England took her own course, 
and left the false King and his false Government 
to their deserved doom. From that time the 
friends of all true freedom, the noblest philan- 
thropists, and the wisest statesmen shrunk with 
horror at the spectacle of meanness, immorality, 
and folly which was seen on the other side of 
the English Channel. The throne of the barri- 
cades had been weighed in the balance, and found 
wanting. All earnest men, whether partisans of 
monarchy or of liberty, could not but deride and 
hate that abominable constitutional government 
which had betrayed its trust, and committed 
crimes from which the most servile tools of ab- 



ANNEXATION OF CRACOW. 377 

solute power in Europe would have shrunk from 
attempting. 

Eetribution on all the actors in that heartless 
tragedy was signal and immediate. Louis 
Philippe and his minister were both obliged to 
fly for refuge to the country they had wronged. 
But the King of the French is now no more : 
his minister lives to contemplate the work of his 
own hands. To have seen the dynasty he had 
so zealously endeavoured to serve ignominiously 
expelled from France, to have seen its fall re- 
garded throughout Europe as merited, to have 
seen all the leading politicians of England look 
with joy at the frustration of those fine schemes 
of dynastic aggrandisement, to have seen the 
English Government happily and gloriously allied 
with a French Emperor, whom the House of 
Orleans had persecuted, and one of whose proud- 
est thoughts is that he deserved their enmity, to 
have seen, above all, the horrible exhibition of 
vice and shamelessness on the Spanish throne; 
and to be conscious that all this, and more than 
this, was his work, that it was the natural 
operation of cause and effect, and that with it in 
all future ages his name must be inseparably asso- 
ciated, must, to one possessed of a heart beating 
with sensibility, and a mind capable of reflection, 
be a punishment more terrible than any that 
Dante has imagined of the damned, and to which 



378 FOREIGN POLICY. 

all the tortures of fiends and furies would be 
heavenly repose. 

Iniquity begets iniquity. The utter destruc- 
tion of the independence of Cracow, and its an- 
nexation to the Austrian dominions, was the 
first consequence of those ill-omened Spanish 
marriages, and the dissensions between France 
and England. On the 10th of October the two 
marriages were celebrated : about the end of 
that month King Louis Philippe had the exqui- 
site gratification of receiving at Paris the Infanta 
as Duchess of Montpensier ; on the 6th of No- 
vember was signed at Vienna a convention, 
" revoking and suppressing " the treaties by 
which the independence of Cracow had been 
guaranteed for ever. M. Guizot then began to 
learn what he had lost in sacrificing the alliance 
with England. He remonstrated ; he protested ; 
he went so far as to declare that the whole of 
the treaties of Vienna had for the future no 
existence. The ministers of the three great 
Powers treated M. Guizot's words and acts with 
contempt ; as indeed they had only too much 
reason for doing. How could the perpetrator of 
the Spanish marriages remonstrate with any 
propriety against the iniquities of other states- 
men ? The injury done to Cracow was a grievous 
one ; but the crime was not of a deeper dye than 
that committed in Spain. 



ANNEXATION OF CRACOW. 379 

Lord Palmerston, too, protested against the 
annexation of Cracow, as he had protested 
against the consummation of the wickedness on 
the other side of the Pyrenees. England stood 
alone, strong in her own moral strength, and 
fearlessly condemned the tyrannical conduct of 
the three despotic Courts, as she had condemned 
the hypocritical French Government. Lord 
Palmerston demolished the manifesto by which 
Prince Metternich pretended to vindicate the 
proceedings of the three Powers ; and Her 
Majesty, on opening Parliament for the session 
of 1847, declared the annexation of Cracow to 
be "a manifest violation of the treaty of Vienna." 

If the year 1836 is to be regarded as that in 
which a strong public hostility to Russia was 
first indicated in the British Parliament, so this 
year 1847 must also be considered as the begin- 
ning of an epoch when the Conservative party 
had entirely worked itself free from that close 
connexion with the arbitrary Powers of Europe 
which it had inherited from Lord Castlereagh. 
The principles of true political morality and 
the vivifying sentiments of manly English na- 
tionality were now applied by Tories, as well 
as Whigs and Radicals, to the consideration of 
our foreign policy. The tyrannical conduct of 



380 FOREIGN POLICY. 

the Austrian Government after the insurrection 
in Silesia, the base and bloody massacre in 
Gallicia, and the final contempt for rights and 
treaties in the recent annexation, had produced 
their natural effect on the minds of English 
gentlemen. The most respectable Conservatives 
united with one voice in supporting the protest 
of Lord Palmers ton ; the allusions to Cracow in 
the debate on the Address, and the discussion 
of the 4th of March on the same subject, were 
cheering symptoms of healthy politics and 
earnest patriotism. When Lord John Russell 
rose early to speak on Mr. Hume's resolutions, 
the full sympathies of the House were with him, 
and his speech was one of the best he ever deli- 
vered on a question of foreign policy. The 
prime minister who in the face of Europe could 
enunciate such noble sentiments was indeed in 
a glorious position, and performed his duty well. 
One of Lord John Russell's sentences on this 
occasion deserves to be blazoned in letters of 
gold above the speaker's chair, and to be re- 
membered in every discussion on foreign affairs. 
" Though in some of the late transactions in 
Europe," said Lord John, " our protests have 
been disregarded, our moral force has been in- 
creased and fortified ; for there is no treaty 
either ancient or modern which we have either 



ANNEXATION OE CRACOW. 381 

violated or set at nought." The loud cheers 
from all sides of the House of Commons en- 
dorsed this emphatic sentence of the Minister. 
Men whose lives had been spent in opposition 
to each other were now all of the same opinion. 
Not only Lord John Eussell and Lord Palmer- 
ston, not only Mr. Hume and Mr. M. Milnes, 
but Sir Robert Peel and Lord Mahon, as well 
as Lord Sandon and Sir Robert Inglis, repro- 
bated the annexation of Cracow, and gave their 
approbation to the policy of the Government. 
They might disagree on the propriety of sus- 
pending the Russo-Dutch loan ; but it must be 
recorded that all the supporters of the Coalition 
Ministry were, so early as 1847, heartily united 
on this vital question affecting the relations of 
England with the Continent. 

One exception, indeed, there was in that 
general chorus of unanimity. One politician 
there was who, not content with defending the 
annexation of Cracow, with eulogising Prince 
Metternich, and with approving of the violation 
of particular treaties of Vienna, also advanced 
doctrines which appeared to countenance the 
disregard of all treaties and all public faith, 
whenever two or three despots might join to- 
gether. Nor did he stop here. As an historical 
fact it ought not to be forgotten, that in this 



382 FOREIGN POLICY. 

discussion, which commenced on the 4th of 
March, 1847, and which was continued for three 
nights, there was one member of the British 
House of Commons who, a few months after the 
time when the blood of the aristocracy of Gal- 
licia had been poured out like water in a com- 
mon massacre, thought it a fitting opportunity 
for calumniating all the Polish nobility, and for 
defending the first partition of Poland. Never, 
from 1772 until this time, had this detestable 
public crime, in which so many other detestable 
public crimes have originated, found an apologist 
in any member of any English party, Liberal or 
Conservative. Even during the supremacy of 
Lord Castlereagh, even in the days of the Con- 
gress of Vienna, even when the hatred of revo- 
lutionists was most violent in England, no poli- 
tician in our Parliament ever stepped forward to 
apologise for that atrocious deed. The peculiar 
glor)^ of Mr. Burke is, that what he stigmatised 
in 1772, when at the head of the Whig oppo- 
sition, he still stigmatised in 1791 and in 1796, 
when he had become the champion of the Con- 
servatives, and the advocate of the allied sove- 
reigns. But in the reformed Parliament, and 
when all the evils of that crime were obvious to 
the meanest understanding, an apologist for the 
partition of Poland was now seen. He declared, 



ANNEXATION OF CRACOW. 383 

and those who listened to him could scarcely 
believe their ears, that " there must have been 
some good cause for that great and numerous 
race having met the doom which they had en- 
countered ; " that " he had no sympathy for the 
race so partitioned ;" that " Poland was a ready 
conspirator, and a pamperer of the lusts of her 
aristocracy ;" that " it was not the great Powers 
who had caused the fall of Poland ;" that those 
who denounced the massacre in Gallicia, and 
spoke well of the Polish nobility, " raised a false 
cry, and appealed to morbid passions." The 
orator sneered at Lord Palmerston. He sneered 
at Sir Robert Peel. He sneered at Sir Robert 
Inglis. They knew nothing of high statesman- 
ship or political morality ; but the individual 
who now addressed them was there to teach 
both these important sciences. The House lis- 
tened in silence to this remarkable speech, the 
like to which had never before been uttered 
within those walls. It was in a different 
strain from any oration on foreign policy 
that Chatham, or Burke, or Fox, or Pitt, or 
Canning, or Peel, or Palmerston, had ever 
spoken. This was the New Toryism; this was 
the New Morality. Members were shocked; 
the people out of doors, when they read that 
speech in the newspapers, were shocked. It was 



384 FOREIGN POLICY. 

considered almost incredible that such sentiments 
should have been expressed. But more incre- 
dible things than this have now been witnessed. 
That orator has lately, as Leader of Opposition, 
represented himself as the supporter of a liberal 
system of foreign policy, and he has even accused 
Lord Aberdeen for being in league with Russia, 
and blamed him for being friendly to Austria, 
though Lord Aberdeen has never, through any 
connivance with Russia, or partiality to Austria, 
thought of defending the partition of Poland. 

Lord Palmerston replied to this speech in a 
thoroughly statesmanlike manner. He proved 
the orator to be mis taken both in his facts and 
his inferences. It was not necessary, said the 
Foreign Secretary, for those who blamed the 
annexation of Cracow, and considered it a viola- 
tion of the Treaty of Vienna, to rely upon the 
annexed treaties. The 6th and 7th articles of 
the general Treaty were quite sufficient for the 
purpose. Nor was it true, as it had been stated, 
that when the Kingdom of the Netherlands was 
dismembered, the only Governments which inter- 
fered in the matter were Russia and England : 
the convention of separation was signed by the 
ministers of all the five Powers, and by one as 
soon as by another. Thus the argument of the 
leader of opposition, based on the fact that par- 



ANNEXATION OF CRACOW. 385 

ticular treaties might be set at nought by one 
party, without the consent of the other contract- 
ing powers, and without injury to the general 
treaty, was fully met, and his instance of the 
establishment of the kingdom of Belgium proved 
to be quite erroneous. Another argument which 
has found its way into the books of some pro- 
fessedly liberal writers on this question, and 
which was also stated by this parliamentary 
advocate of annexation, is just as unsubstantial 
as those which Lord Palmerston so conclusively 
answered. Because the secret history of the 
establishment of the state of Cracow was that 
the Three Powers could not agree which of them 
should possess it, and therefore made it inde- 
pendent in 1815, it did not follow that when they 
had come to an understanding in 1846, they had 
either a moral or a legal right to destroy that 
independence. The most severe condemnation 
of the conduct of the three Governments was that 
pronounced by Sir Robert Peel. A more humi- 
liating confession, said this conservative states- 
man, than for such great Powers as Prussia, 
Russia, and Austria, to inform the world that 
they could not protect themselves from the dis- 
turbances in Cracow without overthrowing its 
independence could not possibly be made. All 
the pretences for this act are indeed contemptible. 

c c 



386 FOREIGN POLICY. 

In the year 1847 there was in the aspect of 
the political world much to gratify the partisans 
of constitutional government. Had it not been 
for the terrible convulsion of the following spring, 
the hopes of many good men might have been 
realised. As we now look back at the pheno- 
mena, they seem indeed only the mutterings of 
the impending storm. But wisdom after the 
event is not always infallible ; it was the merest 
chance that the throne of the King of the French 
fell when it did ; though nothing could have 
permanently upheld it, it might, with all its 
rottenness, have stood for some years. Unfor- 
tunately, at the time when in Germany and Italy 
the aspirations for freedom were assuming a 
definite shape, and the multitude were ready to 
listen to the counsels of prudence and modera- 
tion, a republic was proclaimed in Paris, Europe 
became frenzied with excitement, and wild poli- 
tical visionaries bent on carrying out their insane 
projects through blood and rapine took the lead. 
When they whose natural place in society 
was at the bottom suddenly found themselves at 
the top, moderate reforms were despised, and 
nothing but extreme revolutions and Jacobin re- 
publics would satisfy the craving of the popular 
mind. But the end had not yet come. 

In 1847, free constitutions and political re- 



SWITZERLAND AND POLAND. 387 

forms became the rage. Men were eagerly 
seeking for novelties ; princes suddenly deter- 
mined to be popular ; and at the head of this 
fashionable and liberal movement were the King 
of Prussia and the Pope of Rome. There were 
insurrections, too, in Portugal and in Switzer- 
land ; there were military occupations and mo- 
narchical jealousies ; there was much coaxing, 
and bullying, and protocoling ; it was a busy 
and eager time for sovereigns, ministers, and 
people ; and the busiest among the busy was, as 
ever, Lord Palmerston. He was fairly launched 
in his element. His mediation and advice were 
in continual request ; few of the political pilgrims 
to Downing Street went away unsatisfied from 
the shrine. Lord Palmerston's advice was freely, 
honestly, and, in most instances, wisely given. 
All the disappointments of that sanguine period 
have been visited upon his head ; but, in fact, it 
is as absurd to blame him for the failure of the 
potato crop in Ireland as for the failure of many 
of these new constitutions, which had no sooner 
sprung up than they were destroyed. 

Nor was the labour of the English Secretary 
of State thrown away. He kept the crown on 
the head of the Queen of Portugal. He hin- 
dered Austrian and French troops from invading 
Switzerland, and from destroying, under the 



388 FOREIGN POLICY. 

pretence of religion, the independence of the 
Federal Diet. That the policy of Lord Pal- 
merston, in these two countries, was wise and 
just, experience has proved. Even when the 
revolutionary deluge swept over Europe with 
such terrible violence, Portugal and Switzerland 
remained uninjured in the general devastation. 
Had the extreme liberals in Portugal tri- 
umphed, it is easy to see that a military des- 
potism and the success of the Miguelists must 
have been the final result of the Portuguese 
insurrection. Had the seven Cantons, which 
had leagued themselves together under the name 
of the Sonderbund in 1847, offered a successful 
resistance to the forces of the Diet, that victory 
must in 1848 have been speedily reversed, and 
perhaps have entailed most disastrous con- 
sequences on the brave and ancient republic. 
The true policy in both these cases was that 
which Lord Palmerston followed. In Portugal 
he supported the throne of Donna Maria, but 
insisted on the conformance of her government 
to those constitutional principles which it pro- 
fessed to respect, and on which the monarchy of 
the daughter of Pedro was founded. In Switzer- 
land, it was not what he did, but what he pre- 
vented others from doing, that was so highly 
beneficial to the welfare of the mountaineers. 



POLITICAL MOVEMENTS IN ITALY. 389 

France and Austria were eager to assist the 
Catholic Cantons ; King Louis Philippe had 
undertaken to support abroad that system of 
Jesuitism, against which the revolution of 1830 
was a protest ; and he united with Austria for 
the purpose of introducing those foreign influ- 
ences into Switzerland, which must have been the 
consequences of the success of the Sonderbund. 
Before Lord Palmer ston agreed to the mediation 
of the Five Powers, he insisted on the principle of 
the intervention being distinctly laid down ; some 
delay occurred before the convention was settled ; 
and before it could be presented to the Diet, it 
had triumphed by force of arms. The evils of 
intervention from abroad and disunion at home 
were happily prevented in Switzerland ; the 
terrible storm that was about to rage throughout 
France, Germany, and Italy, passed over the 
Swiss mountains, and while committing frightful 
ravages on all sides, respected the peace, liberty, 
independence, and traditions of that gallant 
little republic, so strongly fortified by nature, 
and so bravely defended through centuries from 
the armies of the oppressor by hereditary valour. 
The first indications of the hurricane might 
even then be heard in the sunny plains of Italy. 
The sky indeed seemed brighter than usual; the 
hearts of all patriots beat with a fonder hope ; at 

c c 3 



390 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Rome the word "freedom" was once more 
openly uttered in the streets haunted by the 
glories of a Brutus and a Cicero ; and though 
the Austrian bayonets glittered in Ferrara, the 
genius of Italy appeared to be reviving, while 
constitutional England prepared to throw before 
it her protecting shield. 

Menaced by Prince Metternich, scarcely sup- 
ported by M. Guizot, the new Pope and the 
patriots who trusted in him looked to Lord 
Palmerston for advice and aid. The head of the 
Church of Rome turned away from the govern- 
ments which professed his faith, and asked 
assistance from the statesman of the great Pro- 
testant Empire. It has since been seen that 
this reforming Pope had indeed no settled prin- 
ciples of liberty ; that he spoke of freedom and 
professed to emancipate his people, without 
having at all calculated the consequences of his 
acts, or the means to attain his ends. To see 
himself applauded as the champion of popular 
rights, was to him a new and exquisite luxury ; 
but it was a very dangerous luxury, and one 
in which he does not seem inclined again to 
indulge. 

Lord Palmerston answered to the call of the 
Italian liberals. In the autumn of 1847, he ac- 
credited Lord Minto on a special mission to the 



close of 1847. 391 

courts of Turin and Florence. At first this 
nobleman seemed to be perfectly successful ; 
throughout Italy his counsels were requested 
and attended to; he advised moderate reforms 
and pacific measures ; under his superintendance, 
the political movements in Italy were happily 
progressing. Had it not been for the tremendous 
impulse given to the revolutionary spirit by the 
great outbreak at Paris in the following year, 
there can be little doubt that Lord Minto's 
diplomatic mission to the Italian States, and the 
cause of Italian independence, would have had 
a very different termination to that which they 
unfortunately experienced. 

The year 1847 ended with peace restored in 
Portugal and Switzerland, with the French go- 
vernment discredited by its recreant policy and 
organised corruption, with the cry for reform 
echoing through France, with Austria sternly 
attempting to keep down the popular spirit in 
Lombardy, and intimidating the Italian princes 
who had yielded to the wishes of their people. 
Lord Palmers ton was closely watched both by 
subjects and sovereigns. 



c c 4 



392 



CHAP. XII. 

count de montalembert's speech on foreign affairs. — 

italian revolutions. lord palmerston's policy in 

1848. austria and hungary. demands for the 

surrendre of refugees. — diplomatic victory of sir 

stratford canning. — greek question. debate in 

the house of commons. lord palmerston's defence. 

— mr. Gladstone's letters to lord Aberdeen. — re- 
tirement OF LORD PALMERSTON. — CONCLUSION. 

The eloquent Count de Montalembert delivered 
a great oration in the French Chambers of Peers, 
on the 13th of January, 1848. His eyes rolling 
with a fine frenzy, he scanned the political hori- 
zon, and after taking a deliberate survey of all 
Europe, his gaze became fixed on one figure, 
whom he regarded as another Eolus, ready to 
let slip the revolutionary winds from their caves. 
There was no danger from Italy, there was no 
danger from the ministers of Austria, the social 
condition of France gave this great religious 
politician no cause for apprehension. From one 
man alone, and his detestable machinations, was 
there any reason for fear; and that individual 
was the Secretary of State of the Queen of 



MONTALEMBERT S SPEECH. 393 

England. He was the great offender. It was 
he who, at the time when France and Austria 
were about to make a demonstration in favour 
of the Swiss Catholics, insisted on a previous 
understanding, while he pressed on hostilities in 
Switzerland, and thus secured the triumph of 
the Kadicals. He was the executioner of Cathol- 
icism. He was kindling a flame which would 
cross the Channel, and show that prosperity, 
liberty, and justice were not the privilege of one 
nation alone. " When noble peers," said Count 
de Montalembert, " stand up in this tribune and 
speak what they think of the Emperor of Aus- 
tria, and Prince Metternich, I may surely declare 
my opinion of Lord Palmerston." 

This address excited much interest. It was 
copied into the English newspapers, and formed 
the theme of many leading articles. Editors 
in France and England echoed the tone of the 
orator, and there was probably not one of the 
kings, courtiers, or ministers, about to expiate 
years of misdeeds by flight and exile, who did 
not impute the unsettled state of society to Lord 
Palmerston, and not to their own misgovernment 
and folly. This was the cant of the period. 
Wherever there were disorders committed or 
revolutionary outbreaks apprehended, Lord Pal- 
merston was sure to be considered the cause of 



394 FOREIGN POLICY. 

all troubles. This minister justly said, that no 
imputation could be more vulgar or more un- 
founded than to accuse him of wishing to excite 
discontent ; in fact, such an imputation was 
just as absurd as to represent Lord Aberdeen as 
wishing to see absolute power established in all 
countries. The party spirit of the moment gave 
a currency to both these charges ; and they were 
only too much authorised by these two states- 
men themselves. Lord Aberdeen most unjustly 
said that Lord Palmerston endeavoured to create 
revolutions ; and Lord Palmerston most unjustly 
retorted that Lord Aberdeen endeavoured to 
make despotisms. 

Lord Minto's journey to Italy was much 
blamed by the Opposition in the session of 1848. 
Every Englishman may now, on looking back 
with calmness on the fearful agitation of Europe, 
be thankful that this well-intentioned but unfor- 
tunate mission, was the most important subject 
of controversy in Parliament at a time when the 
King of Prussia was compelled to leave his 
" beloved Berliners," when the Emperor of 
Austria was obliged to fly twice from Vienna, 
when the barricades of Paris were taken by 
storm after a deadly conflict, when the Austrian 
troops were driven out of Milan, the King of 
Bavaria forced to abdicate, the King of Naples 



ITALIAN REVOLUTIONS. 395 

all but lost Sicily, and even the good Pope found 
himself obliged to escape in disguise from Rome. 
Lord Palmerston's mediation was asked both by 
the Emperor of Austria and the King of Naples. 
Austria went so far as to offer to give up Lom- 
bardy ; and if the Court of Yienna felt their 
hold on Italy so desperate, Lord Palmerston 
cannot be censured for not thinking better of 
the chances of Austria than herself. Mediation 
was then an impossibility. The only arbiter to 
whom the excited populace could be made to 
listen was the sword. The time for compromise 
was in 1847, and at that time Austria refused 
with contempt to hear the counsels of moder- 
ation. Some of the Governments of Italy, 
indeed, were prepared to accept Lord Minto as 
an umpire ; but after the revolution in Paris, 
they were powerless to resist the contagion of 
that fierce distemper. Again, a few months 
later, when Palermo was exposed to such a 
terrible bombardment, it was the duty of the 
English representative to attempt to stop that 
wholesale massacre and devastation. It was 
not, however, by supplying arms to the Sicilians 
that this end could be attained ; and there was 
an error of this nature committed, which, had 
it been the effect of design, would have been 
highly censurable. But it was not so. Lord 



396 FOREIGN POLICY. 

Palmerston strongly and repeatedly asserted that 
all his efforts were made in order to bring about 
peace and moderate reforms. He could not be 
answerable for the success of his exertions at 
such a time ; but that he sincerely meant well 
there can be no doubt whatever. His advice 
was never once given in Italy until it had been 
earnestly desired ; and if it was not followed, he 
only experienced the common fortune of advisers, 
whose opinions are seldom acted upon unless 
they happen to coincide with the sentiments of 
those to whom they are given. 

In Spain, however, he did, without being re- 
quested, state in plain words what his ideas were 
on Spanish politics, and foretold what the effect 
of the policy pursued in that country would be. 
The prophecy hjas very lately been fulfilled ; the 
despatch was immediately returned. Unques- 
tionably it was not such an epistle as ought to 
be written by the minister of one independent 
Government to the minister of another. As un- 
questionably, however, in that tempestuous time, 
Lord Palmerston, who had done so much for the 
Spanish dynasty and the Spanish Government, 
had a right, even unasked, to advise the rulers 
of that nation. The despatch in which his 
opinions were conveyed, was not intended for 
the perusal of the Duke of Sotomayor ; and Mr. 



lord palmerston's POLICY. 397 

Bulwer, in presenting it, committed an error in 
judgment ; but if, instead of being offended at 
the tone of it, the Spanish Government had 
taken the course the English minister recom- 
mended, the throne of Queen Isabella would 
have been much more secure than it now is, and 
the public morality of Spain in a much better 
condition. Time has generally brought about a. 
sure revenge for Lord Palmerston ; one after 
another his enemies have fallen. His most 
bitter foes, too, have been almost without excep- 
tion, like Count Ficquelmont and the Emperor 
of Kussia, either secretly or openly, also the 
most bitter foes of England. 

In Belgium the effect of the seventy protocols 
was now seen. While great empires were 
dashed upon the rocks, this little kingdom tri- 
umphantly rode out the storm. The Radicals of 
1831 had, through the wise Government of King 
Leopold, become prudent politicians, and now 
rejected with disdain all the advances of the 
French propagandists. After such a successful 
experiment, it is impossible to declare that 
swords and bayonets are the only efficacious 
remedies for curing popular distempers. The 
Belgians in 1831, were quite as impracticable as 
the Italians and Germans of 1848 ; and though 
it may be necessary to use military force as a 



898 FOREIGN POLICY. 

temporary expedient, it is only by such methods 
of government as the King of Belgium adopted 
and steadily adhered to, that revolutions can 
permanently be prevented. 

In this terrible year it was not the folly of 
the mobs nor the recklessness of popular leaders 
that was most remarkable; the most humiliating 
exhibition of all was that of royal cowardice. 
The great King of the French, the great Em- 
peror of Austria, and the great King of Prussia, 
as well as the little German and Italian Princes, 
made before the world the same pusillanimous 
display. The white feather was the fashionable 
plume in courts, and monarchs kept monarchs in 
countenance. But the most ridiculous of all the 
ridiculous sovereigns of 1848 was certainly Fre- 
derick William the Fourth, King of Prussia. 
Even the old King of Bavaria with his wild 
mistress did not appear half so foolish as 
His Prussian Majesty with his great promises, 
his long speeches, his abject flattery, his mean- 
ness, and his timidity. He shouted as loudly for 
German unity as the most rabid radical at Frank- 
fort. He cringed to the populace. He cringed to 
the students. He would do anything, say any- 
thing. He forgot all his obligations to Russia and 
Austria ; he attempted to rob the King of Den- 
mark of a portion of his territories with as little 



PRUSSIA AND DENMARK. 399 

compunction as any liberal felt who wished to 
dismember the House of Hapsburg and Lorraine. 
When such was the morality of Kings, how could 
they expect the ignorant and excited multitude 
to have better principles than themselves? To 
enter into an arithmetical calculation of the 
crimes perpetrated respectively by the people 
and by Kings, and to set one against the other, 
would be a dangerous and questionable pro- 
ceeding. The balance might, however, be found 
in some degree even. The evil was certainly 
not, as such writers as Count Ficquelmont incul- 
cate, all on one side. 

The conduct of the King of Prussia to Den- 
mark was much less excusable than the con- 
duct of the King of Sardinia to Austria. The 
invasion of Schleswig was less defensible than 
the invasion of Lombardy ; for the hatred of 
the Lombards to the Austrian was intense ; and 
notwithstanding all that has been said to the 
contrary, they were treated with great brutality; 
while the King of Denmark had given his 
subjects in Schleswig, as in other parts of his 
dominions, a constitution, and his Government 
had been peculiarly mild and tolerant. In Eng- 
land the King of Prussia had no defenders ; nor 
in any part of Europe except among the violent 
partisans of German unity in Frankfort. The 



400 FOREIGN POLICY. 

family ties which are now supposed to be so 
strong between the courts of St. Petersburg and 
Berlin as to prevent the House of Hohenzol- 
lern from striking a single blow in defence of 
the independence of Europe, were not strong 
enough to prevent the two Courts from taking 
decidedly opposite sides on the comparatively 
unimportant question of the Duchies of Schleswig 
and Holstein. Prussia may be the tool of Russia; 
but the Emperor Nicholas has shown that he at 
least will never be the tool of his German brother- 
in-law. When German interests are subservient 
to his own purposes, the Autocrat respects them; 
but as soon as they come into antagonism with 
his policy they are contemptuously set aside. 
The Russian fleet, commanded by the Grand 
Duke Constantine, was off the coast of Denmark 
while the Prussian army was in Jutland, and 
was quite ready, had the necessity arisen, to act- 
offensively against the forces of the Emperor's 
good brother and faithful ally. 

Much learning has been displayed in discussing 
the rights of the Duchies of Schleswig and Hol- 
stein. The intricacies of the historical parts of 
this question resemble the long diplomatic con- 
troversy which began with the Prussian invasion, 
and was not finally concluded when Lord Pal- 
merston left the Foreign Office. The arrange- 
ment made when hostilities were first suspended 



AUSTRIA AND HUNGARY. 401 

between Denmark and Prussia, showed how 
commanding was the position of the English 
statesman. Wherever line-of-battle ships might 
float, the influence of England could not but 
prevail, and the weight of Eussia become com- 
paratively light. In the contest that was going 
on in the plains of Hungary, the relative power 
of England and Russia was entirely changed. 
There Russia was strong, and England weak ; 
and because Russia was strong and England 
weak, the constitutional liberties of Hungary 
were destroyed, and with them the political 
independence of Austria. Lord Palmerston saw 
well the nature and the consequences of the 
struggle from the beginning. Had some of those 
exiled Hungarians, who have since blamed him 
for not more resolutely becoming the champion 
of their nation, understood the comprehensive 
bearings of the question as well as he did, the 
result might have been very different. They 
unhappily acted as though they were determined 
to give Russia the occasion to interfere, instead 
of confining themselves to the simple assertion 
of their rights. They desired to make the 
struggle not merely a Hungarian, but a universal 
conflict in which all the oppressed nations of the 
earth might at once find a simultaneous deliver- 
ance ; and like all such great abstract schemes, 

D D 



402 FOKEIGN POLICY. 

formed in opposition to circumstances, their 
heroic endeavours ended in a glorious but lament- 
able failure. Polish generals fought for Poland 
in Hungary ; their aim was to prevent Hungary 
from ever again becoming united with Austria ; 
with this object were the resolutions of the 14th 
of April, 1849, passed by the Hungarian Cham- 
bers. They met at the time with the approba- 
tion of Bern and Dembinski ; and all politicians 
who look on the greatness of the conception, and 
not to the possibility of its execution, have praised 
the Hungarian patriots for thus carrying matters 
to an extremity. 

Very different, however, must be the opinion 
of the calm and impartial observer. He may at 
once admit that he cannot see his way to the 
realisation of such plans, and confess that they 
are infinitely beyond his capacity. Such was the 
opinion of Lord Palmerston ; such was the opin- 
ion of Lord Aberdeen. These resolutions were a 
serious error ; they afforded Russia a justification 
for marching her troops into Hungary, and they 
also effectually hindered the English minister 
from undertaking any mediation at that time with 
any prospect of success. To insult the exile who 
has sought an asylum in England would be most 
ungenerous ; but the truth must be told : the 
great Hungarian chief who was the principal 



AUSTRIA AND HUNGARY. 403 

author of these resolutions, can see plainly the 
mistakes of every one else, but is quite blind to 
his own. His standing accusation against Lord 
Palmerston is, that the Foreign Secretary did 
not feel himself justified in receiving an Hunga- 
rian ambassador, and of thus provoking a rup- 
ture with Austria and Eussia. But, had M. 
Kossuth intended to place it entirely out of Lord 
ralmerston's power to render any assistance to 
the constitutional cause of LIungary, these reso- 
lutions were quite sufficient for that purpose. 
When the cause ceased to be constitutional, the 
Russian sword could be the only arbitrator. 

Count Nesselrode's manifesto, by which the 
governments of Europe were informed that the 
Emperor Nicholas had determined to support by 
force of arms the House of Hapsburg, followed 
close on the publication of M. Kossuth's resolu- 
tions. It cannot be denied that Count Nessel- 
rode had only too much reason for stating that 
the plans of the leaders of the insurrection had 
become greater with the success of their arms ; 
that they had exhibited the most hostile inten- 
tions against Russia; that her Polish provinces 
were threatened ; and that under the circum- 
stances, and when directly appealed to by Austria, 
she could not remain inactive. 

This despatch of Count Nesselrode was singu- 

D D 2 



404 FOREIGN POLICY. 

larly moderate in its tone ; and however much 
Lord Palmerston might regret the Russian inter- 
vention, he could not have prevented it. M. 
Kossuth has indeed declared, that he asked 
neither for the money of England nor for the 
blood of England ; that all he required was one 
little word, and that this word Lord Palmerston 
refused to speak. This is easily said. But that 
"little word," so innocent in appearance, must have 
meant war, or it could have meant nothing. To 
suppose that Austria, when backed by the arms 
of Russia, would yield to the mere moral force of 
England is absurd. The Hungarian struggle 
was, indeed, watched with great interest in this 
country ; the good wishes of the people were 
strongly in favour of the insurgents ; and it is 
impossible not to respect the reasons for that 
generous sympathy. There is much in common 
between the national character of the Hungarian 
and the Englishman ; and no man with a heart 
in his breast could be indifferent while such a 
contest was in progress. But nevertheless, Eng- 
land could no more have gone to war in 1849 
for Hungary, than she could have gone to war 
in 1829 for Turkey. Those who blame Lord 
Palmerston in the one case, are just as unreason- 
able as those who blame Lord Aberdeen in the 
other. The cloud which M. Kossuth sees hang- 



AUSTRIA AND HUNGARY. 405 

ing over Westminster Hall because of the answer 
which Lord Palmers ton returned to his emissary, 
is a cloud which has settled down on his own 
understanding, and prevented him from making 
any allowance for the circumstances in which 
the English Secretary of State was placed, and 
for the great responsibilities of his position. 

The first duty of an English minister is to 
England. He cannot be a cosmopolitan; he 
must be a patriot. There is a time for all things 
and for all men. The time, though near, had 
not yet come for England to meet Russia in open 
conflict. The lists had not yet been opened ; the 
place for the deadly grapple had not yet been 
chosen ; the gauntlet had not yet been cast at 
her feet. As long as Russia avoided any direct 
hostilities against England, and faithfully adhered 
to treaties, however injurious some of these trea- 
ties might be to the interests of Europe, it was 
not for the English Government to seek an occa- 
sion for a quarrel. Public opinion in England 
would not have permitted it ; the sentiments of 
all civilised Europe would not have permitted 
it ; and had England once directly interfered in 
the conflict between Hungary and Austria, she 
must have been prepared to accept all the pos- 
sible results of that intervention. 

Lord Palmerston did not believe that there 

DD 3 



40 G FOREIGN POLICY. 

was then any chance of seeing a Hungary inde- 
pendent of Austria, or a Poland independent of 
the Three Powers. But nothing less than this, 
after the resolutions of the 14th of April, would 
have satisfied Bern and Dembinski, and M. Kos- 
suth. Until complete victory had crowned the 
efforts of one side or the other, both the con- 
tending parties would have refused the terms 
Lord Palmerston might have officially proposed. 
They would both have laughed in his face ; and 
he might justly then have been blamed for that 
officious intermeddling which has too frequently 
been laid to his charge. 

But it is not true that he watched the contest 
with stolid indifference. In privately repre- 
senting to Austria the dangers she incurred by 
calling in Russian assistance, and advising her 
in the most friendly manner, to agree to any 
compromise with her disaffected subjects, rather 
than place the imperial crown in the power of 
her insidious northern ally, he did all that he 
fairly could do until the conflict was decided. 
Austria, indeed, madly rejected his advice ; 
though, had Lord Aberdeen been in office, he 
would most unquestionably, with the welfare 
of Austria sincerely at heart, have given her the 
same counsel. 

The success of the Russian troops, and the 



AUSTRIA AND HUNGARY. 407 

conduct of one of the Hungarian generals, soon 
rendered the termination of the war and the 
subjugation of Hungary inevitable. Then Lord 
Palmerston hoped that Austria would not be 
blind to her own interests, and that she would, 
by accepting his offer of mediation, give him 
the opportunity of strengthening her independ- 
ence, and of releasing her from the shackles of 
Russia. In vain, however, were all attempts 
made to awaken the Austrian Government to a 
true sense of its position. Prince Schwarzen- 
berg, a man of violent passions, and furious in 
his prejudices against England, could see nothing 
but his own wretched antipathies. Lord Pal- 
merston made a final effort, in a despatch of the 
28th of August, 1849, to induce the House of 
Hapsburg to make " a generous use " of the 
victory which another Power had gained for it, 
to respect "the ancient constitutional rights of 
Hungary," and to provide for the " future 
strength of the Austrian Empire." Prince 



o 



mpn 



Schwarzenberg would not listen to such repre- 
sentations. He thought fit to send, in reply, a 
foolish and insulting despatch, in which he 
reminded the English minister of " unhappy 
Ireland," and of other dominions of the British 
Crown, in which he supposed the authority of 
this empire was reduced to the same miserable 

D D 4 



408 FOREIGN POLICY. 

condition as that over which he presided. No- 
thing could be more unbecoming than such a 
reply to such a communication. No words can 
describe as it deserves, the puerile conduct of 
the Austrian minister, who, at a time when the 
Empire had only been saved by the direct 
interposition of another Power, could turn round 
upon England, and in answer to some good ad- 
vice, display his impotence and his arrogance, 
his poverty and his pride. 

It was not long before the temporary cessation 
of the existence of Austria as an independent 
political power began to be felt throughout 
Europe. At the very time when Lord Pal- 
merston was composing that warning despatch 
of the 28 th of August, which was so ungraciously 
received at Vienna, Sir Stratford Canning was 
writing from Constantinople, that the Austrian 
Minister had demanded the persons of all the 
refugees who, after their defeat, had fled across 
the Turkish frontier* The English ambassador 
immediately counselled resistance, and assured 
the Sultan of the support of his Government. 
He justly observed that the neutrality of Turkey 
had been much more violated during the Hun- 
garian contest by the invasion of the Principa- 
lities and the passage of the Russian troops from 
the Principalities into Transylvania than by the 



DEMAND OF REFUGEES. 409 

sympathies of the Porte for the Hungarians. The 
Emperor Nicholas had acted as though these 
two provinces really belonged to his own Empire, 
and had not the slightest connection with 
Turkey. And now he had resolved, with 
Austria at his feet, to show to the world that 
the Sultan Abdul Medjid was indeed his slave. 
Imperious at all times, the tone of the Czar's 
agents was now still more imperious. Though 
the first demand was made by Austria, it was 
evident that Russia was the real actor in the 
drama. Austria was never thought of at all ; 
she was only obeying the commands of her 
master. An autograph letter from Nicholas 
and some strong declarations from his ambassador 
succeeded to the Austrian application. Russia 
demanded the Poles; her vassal, the Hungarians ; 
but the spirit of both demands was the same. 

The Turkish ministers were alarmed ; but 
under the influence of Sir Stratford Canning 
they persisted in their refusal. Then was seen 
the real value of the Treaty of the 13th of July, 
1841. Then was seen whether Russia had lost 
or gained in the long diplomatic struggle from 
the treaties of Adrianople and Unkiar Skelessi. 
She found herself powerless ; she found the 
British Ambassador the directing spirit of the 
Divan ; she found that even in the moment of 



410 FOREIGN POLICY. 

her success in Hungary and with Austria in her 
power, the Porte ventured to look her steadily 
in the face, and bid her defiance. All the 
manoeuvres of the Emperor, all the dexterity of 
his diplomacy, all his military occupations, all 
his moderation in 1839, and his careful watching 
of events, had ended in securing the triumph of 
the English Minister. He saw that in twenty 
years he had not advanced a step towards 
Constantinople. He saw that comparing 1829 
with 1849, he had clearly lost ground. This he 
might have suspected before, but now it was 
evident to the whole world. For the first time 
since the days of Peter the Great, the star of the 
House of Romanoff was receding in the East. 
Judging by the experience of 1839 and 1849, 
was it so very certain that the throne of the 
Constantines would become the inheritance of 
the successors of Nicholas ? Was it not England 
who now gained in every Eastern crisis ? These 
forebodings crossed the mind of the Emperor; 
and from the moment when he was obliged to 
content himself with seeing the refugees sent 
into the interior of Turkey, and placed under 
close surveillance, instead of being surren- 
dered to the tender mercies of the imperial 
court-martials, his resolution to retrieve his po- 
sition in the East by some bold diplomatic 



SIR STRATFORD CANNINGS DIPLOMACY. 411 

stroke, such as the mission of Prince Menschikoff, 
was taken. The affair of the Holy Places, by 
which France, encouraged by the example of 
England, attempted, though in a more question- 
able manner, to gain for herself an influence in 
the East in decided opposition to Russia, only 
confirmed him still more strongly in this deter- 
mination. 

There were, however, some great obstacles to 
be overcome before the decision could be acted 
upon with any chance of success. Sir Stratford 
Canning was raised to the peerage for his great 
services in the diplomatic war. Public opinion 
in England was strongly in favour of the stand 
which the Porte had made against the united 
power of Russia and Austria. All parties had 
concurred in approving the policy of the Govern- 
ment ; as in 1840, so at this time, the English 
people on this great question had rallied round 
the ministry. Lord Palmerston, too, was still 
Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. The 
promptitude with which this Minister had, 
without any communication with Russia, sent 
the fleet to Besika Bay, showed what might be 
expected from him in future. The Emperor 
Nicholas well remembered what the same states- 
man had done in the past. The pale shade of 
Mehemet Ali rose before the haughty Emperor, 



412 FOREIGN POLICY. 

and pointed to the Minister in the Foreign 
Office of England. In both instances. Lord 
Palmerston had acted, according to his own 
significant language, " like a man who meant to 
do what he professed." 

It would have been well had not the Minister 
soon afforded his political opponents in England 
and the Emperor of Russia an opportunity for 
working his overthrow. Had the fleet, on its 
return from the Turkish coast, quietly an- 
chored in some luxurious haven, satisfied with 
its achievements in Besika Bay, and between the 
outer and inner castles of the Dardanelles, Lord 
Palmerston might have rested safely on the lau- 
rels he had won ; but rejoicing in one victory 
over Russia, he had resolved to have another 
triumph. He had demonstrated that he was more 
than a match for the Czar in Turkey; he now 
made up his mind to try a fall with him in Greece. 

The Government of King Otho, trusting in 
the protection of the Emperor Nicholas, had 
presumed to treat with the most contemptuous 
indifference the remonstrances of the British 
Minister. His Hellenic Majesty had never 
forgotten the advice which England gave him 
when he thought of freeing himself from his 
constitutional engagements. The plain repre- 
sentations which both Lord Aberdeen and Lord 



STATE OF GREECE. 413 

Palmerston made to him rankled in his heart, 
and under the skilful diplomatic surgery 
of Russia, festered into a positive hatred to 
England and everything English. The sys- 
tem of brigandage, the curse of the Turkish 
rule, continued even under the rule of King 
Otho. The most barbarous tortures were in- 
flicted, the laws violated, the judges corrupted, 
and outrages of every kind committed with the 
connivance, sanction, and encouragement of the 
Court of Athens. Though the Greek subjects 
of King Otho were treated with great cruelty, 
and though the condition of his little king- 
dom was most disgraceful, the Ionians and 
Maltese, and all who had any right to be con- 
sidered subjects of the British Crown, were 
peculiarly the marks for insult and oppression. 
They were whipped and thumb-screwed ; they 
were robbed and pillaged ; the unarmed boats' 
crew of a British ship of war was beaten by 
the Greek soldiers, and taken into custody. 
Mr. Finlay, a gentleman of Scottish origin, 
could get no payment for some land, of which 
the king had taken possession to build a pa- 
lace upon and lay out a garden. M. Pacifico, 
a Portuguese Jew, had his house broken into, 
and his furniture destroyed by a mob in open 
day, and within a short distance of the guard- 



414 FOREIGN POLICY. 

house. For all these multiplied and manifold 
injuries redress was demanded; for none of 
them could any reparation, or even any apology, 
be obtained. Yet all these men were British 
subjects ; and all of them, however humble their 
condition, had therefore claims on the British 
flag. 

On the 26th of December, 1849, the English 
Minister at Athens informed the Greek Govern- 
ment that it would act unwisely if, counting on 
the forbearance of England, it neglected to 
satisfy the demands which had been made. The 
threat was no unmeaning one, as King Otho and 
his little Court soon learnt to their surprise and 
dismay. The English squadron appeared off 
the coast. Twenty -four hours were specified as 
the time in which, if no negotiation was entered 
into for the purpose of settling the claims, a 
formal demand would be made. No satisfactory 
answer was given ; a formal demand was made 
by Mr. Wyse ; and other twenty-four hours 
were allotted as the period for compliance. 
The Greek Minister, strong in the support of 
France and Eussia, refused to yield, and appealed 
to these two guaranteeing Powers of the new 
Kingdom. King Otho's Government was in- 
formed that none of their vessels would be 
allowed to leave the Piraeus. The steamer Otho 



RUSSIA DEFIED IN GREECE. 415 

ventured out, and was soon in the power of 
the English admiral ; \ " reprisals " were now 
made against the humble navy of his classic 
Majesty. There was of course no resisting the 
huge line-of-battle ships which, after protecting 
Turkey, now threatened Greece. King Otho 
and his Ministers protested against such violence, 
and confessed their weakness. An embargo was 
next laid on the mercantile marine ; so stern 
and unyielding had now become the patient 
English Minister, and so boldly was the influence 
of Russia defied. The French Government hav- 
ing offered its good offices, they were accepted 
by Lord Palmerston, though he carefully guarded 
himself from surrendering in any degree the 
principle of the claims. Baron Gros went to 
Athens for the purpose of amicably arranging 
the business ; but M. Pacifico's demands were 
a sad stumbling-block in the way of a satisfactory 
settlement. A misunderstanding occurred be- 
tween the British and French diplomatists ; 
Baron Gros declared his mission at an end ; 
force was again resorted to ; and unfortunately, 
while in London an equitable convention was 
being concluded between Lord Palmerston and 
M. Drouyn de Lhuys, the Government at Athens 
was compelled to yield at discretion to Mr. Wyse 
and the British fleet. A serious difference be- 



416 FOREIGN POLICY. 

tween France and England was the consequence 
of this mistake, and the French Ambassador 
left London for Paris. 

JSTor was this the only evil attending this 
naval demonstration against Greece. A powerful 
political party in England, composed of many 
different sections, highly disapproved of the 
manner in which this affair had been conducted. 
The Emperor Nicholas thought that now the time 
was come when Lord Palmerston could be driven 
from office, and a formidable despatch was ful- 
minated from St. Petersburg at the head of the 
English Foreign Secretary. All his political 
adversaries combined against him, and the House 
of Lords passed resolutions by which his policy 
in general, and his conduct to Greece in par- 
ticular, was emphatically censured. A supporter 
of the Ministry moved counter resolutions in the 
House of Commons, and the finest debate on 
foreign policy which has ever been witnessed 
began on the 24th of June 1850, and was bril- 
liantly maintained for four nights by all the 
ablest speakers and most influential politicians of 
that great assembly. 

Lord Palmerston, on the second evening of 
the discussion, in a speech which excited the 
wonder of all who listened to him, and which 
was as much admired by his opponents as by his 



LORD PALMERSTON's DEFENCE. 417 

friends, proceeded to vindicate the policy that 
had been' so elaborately arraigned and so vehe- 
mently condemned. The shades of evening 
gathered round him as he continued to address 
the House, and before he had concluded, the 
dawn of morning shone through the windows on 
a still attentive audience. Yet so masterly had 
been the effort, so clear the exposition, so inter- 
esting the narrative, and so dignified and mo- 
derate the tone, that probably not one listener 
felt the least sensation of weariness. Nor was 
this the only marvel. The minister grew warmer 
and more animated as period after period flowed 
from his lips, and appeared to deliver his lofty 
peroration, in which he boldly challenged the 
verdict of the Commons, with as much freshness 
and strength as when he first commenced to 
speak. All who looked upon the statesman that 
night, and observed his manly bearing, his digni- 
fied courage, his earnestness, and the consummate 
ability with which he handled all the subjects he 
touched, all who remembered the great negotia- 
tions with which for so many years his name 
had been associated, and who saw what youthful 
fire was yet burning brightly under the grey 
crust of age, could not but feel that high emotion 
to which Sir Robert Peel afterwards gave utter- 
ance, and acknowledge that whether the cause 

EE 



418 FOREIGN POLICY. 

the orator so ably defended was right or wrong, 
he was in himself one of the most perfect repre- 
sentatives of the English character that has ever 
lived upon this earth, and a just source of pride 
to the country whose interests and whose honour 
he had so long, so faithfully, and so patriotically 
upheld in every part of the world. 

On the next evening of the debate,, a great 
speech, of which the highest praise that can be 
given to it is that it was a worthy reply to that 
of Lord Palmerston, was delivered by Mr. Glad- 
stone. There were many very excellent ad- 
dresses made ; but these two speeches stand out 
from the rest as masterpieces of very different 
kinds, and embodying the sentiments of two 
very different statesmen. 

On the Greek question public opinion is yet 
divided. The weakness of Greece has pleaded 
strongly in her favour with some politicians, 
who thought, and justly thought, that the ne- 
cessity for undertaking offensive measures 
against such a humble State ought to have been 
obvious to all mankind, that every effort should 
have been made to effect a pacific settlement, 
and that full warning should have been given, 
not to Greece alone, but to France and Russia 
as protecting Powers, before the strong arm of 
England had been raised even in a just cause 



LORD PALMERSTON'S DEFENCE. 419 

against such a puny member of the great com- 
monwealth of nations. There was no glory to 
be gained in coercing Greece ; and if Russian 
influences were to be combated, the place for in- 
timidation was not Athens but St. Petersburg. 

British subjects are unquestionably entitled to 
protection when residing in foreign lands ; and 
if that protection cannot be afforded them by the 
legal tribunals of the country, with all due re- 
spect to the House of Lords, they have then a 
good right to look for it at the hands of their 
Government. But before their claims are en- 
dorsed by the Foreign Secretary, he ought to be 
sure that they are not exaggerated, and that 
they are in every respect honest. It is not 
enough to insist that the offending Power should 
disprove the accusations of an alien; it is the 
duty of the injured person to prove to the satis- 
faction of his Government, before calling upon it 
for assistance, that his demands are strictly just. 
If this reasoning be sound, and the principle 
correct, it is impossible to approve in every re- 
spect of the manner in which M. Pacifico's claims 
were adopted and enforced. In this demonstra- 
tion against Greece, and in the mediation of 
France, there were certainly many errors com- 
mitted ; but it is not clear that Lord Palmerston 
was to blame. The best schemes are liable to 

E E 2 



420 FOREIGN POLICY. 

miscarriage ; the best diplomatic agents some- 
times make mistakes ; and Lord Palmerston was 
not the man to extricate himself from an em- 
barrassing position by accusing his subordinates. 

Though it must be admitted that there were 
blunders and indiscretions in this interference, 
it may be questioned whether it was fair to 
single Lord Palmerston out, and while driving 
him from office, to brand his whole public 
career. This was the design of Sir James Gra- 
ham's vehement invective ; and there was much 
in it that was painfully invidious and unneces- 
sarily acrimonious. It is a relief to turn from 
that speech to Mr. Gladstone's, in which there 
was nothing said but what a high-minded poli- 
tical opponent might justly express. 

The doctrine of Roman citizenship, though 
extremely flattering to national pride, certainly 
cannot be applied in the present state of the 
w r orld. In the days of Roman glory there was 
but one state, one empire, one people, one law ; 
but in the multiform and complex relations of 
modern Europe, neither Oliver Cromwell nor 
any statesman can free himself from those in- 
ternational regulations which, whatever some 
theorists may imagine, are founded on the accu- 
mulated experience of ages, and are established 
especially for the defence of the weak against 



CIVIS ROM ANUS SUM. 421 

the dictatorship of the strong. Yet this doc- 
trine of Roman citizenship would, on the one 
extreme, as the doctrine of the Peace Society on 
the other, come to the same conclusion, and end 
in overthrowing all the barriers of international 
law, and in handing mankind over to the mercy 
of the most powerful and the most unscru- 
pulous of tyrants. But the civis Romanus 
sum, as it is introduced into Cicero's magnifi- 
cent oration, was most properly brought for- 
ward. The tortured Roman is made to appeal 
to a law which his oppressors, and even the 
people of the provinces acknowledged ; and 
Cicero, who, like Burke, was as great a moralist 
as a politician, orator, and philosopher, acted 
quite rightly in putting it in front of his 
accusation against a Roman governor. Burke, 
too, might, for the same reason, justly assert 
the same principle in his denunciations of Has- 
tings ; for he was only insisting that the morals 
and the laws of England should also shield the 
natives of India, and that a crime perpetrated 
in Hindostan was of the same dye, and merited 
the same punishment, as a crime perpetrated in 
the United Kingdom. But to assert this civis 
Romanus sum in other countries, and against 
the jurisdiction of foreign Governments, is to 
misapprehend the spirit in which the Roman 

E E 3 



422 FOREIGN POLICY. 

orator used the exclamation. And to represent 
Lord Palmerston as maintaining, in his quota- 
tion of the same words, that his countrymen, 
when abroad, were above the laws of other 
nations, and that they did not recognise the 
legal authorities of the countries in which they 
found themselves, is, perhaps, equally to mis- 
apprehend the meaning of the English states- 
man. He could only intend saying, that if 
Englishmen could not obtain justice from Go- 
vernments abroad, they should have, in their 
endeavours to seek it, the moral, and, if neces- 
sary, the material support of their Government 
at home. In the principle, as thus understood, 
both the Lords and Commons of England, as 
well as the great body of the people in every 
rank and condition, cannot but heartily agree ; 
for to deny it would be to admit that their 
countrymen in all lands might be considered 
passive victims of oppression and extortion, 
wherever there was an arbitrary king, a cruel 
minister, a corrupt tribunal, or an ignorant po- 
pulace. Mr. Gladstone and Lord Palmerston, 
after all, meant the same thing, however much 
their opinions might seem opposed. 

There was indeed one part of Mr. Glad- 
stone's speech which, admiring it as every one 
must do as a whole, was quite erroneous. He 



MR. GLADSTONE. 423 

drew a distinction between the intervention of 
Mr. Canning and Lord Palmerston : and affirmed 
that the earlier statesman had been successful in 
his interference in Portugal and in South Ame- 
rica, while the Foreign Secretary of the Whigs 
had been in almost every instance unsuccessful 
and inexcusable in his meddling with the affairs 
of other countries. Mr. Gladstone even selected 
for especial panegyric Mr. Canning's extraor- 
dinary sentence about " calling the New World 
into existence to redress the balance of the 
Old," and considered such intervention as a per- 
fect model of wisdom and success. But in fact, 
Mr. Canning's South American republics were 
not at all remarkable as successful political cre- 
ations ; and the British troops had scarcely been 
withdrawn from Portugal, when the constitution 
which he virtually, though not directly, at- 
tempted to save, was subverted. It seems then 
almost impossible to believe that if Mr. Can- 
ning's intervention in Portugal and South Ame- 
rica was quite right, Lord Palrnerston's inter- 
vention in Portugal and Belgium, where there 
are established constitutions entirely from his 
exertions, was quite wrong. 

Lord Palmerston was blamed for perilling our 
relations with the great monarchical Powers by 
his constitutional propagandism. Mr. Glad- 

E E 4 



424 FOREIGN POLICY. 

stone argued, with much force and eloquence, 
that if England set about diffusing her political 
opinions and institutions, other States would take 
the same course ; that the name of each Govern- 
ment would be the symbol of a party, and the 
consequence ensue that a system would be esta- 
blished destructive to the peace and happiness 
of the world. Abstractedly, nothing can be 
sounder than this argument ; but the application 
of it is scarcely just. If there is one unques- 
tionable truth to be evolved from the summary 
of the foreign policy since 1815, it is this: that 
it was not England who first set about spread- 
ing her opinions and form of Government 
throughout Europe; that she was forced at 
last to do so in self-defence ; and that her 
first quarrel with the allied Governments 
occurred in the time of Lord Castlereagh him- 
self, when he refused to accede to the protocol 
of Trappau, which he thought contained prin- 
ciples most extensive in their application, and 
hostile to the independence of all the weaker 
States. It was because the Holy Alliance sys- 
tematically propagated despotisms, that England, 
as a simply defensive policy, was obliged to 
support a more generous system. Mr. Canning 
was as much assailed for his liberal policy by 
France, Prussia, Austria, and Russia, as ever 



COUNT NESSELROEE's DESPATCH. 425 

Lord Palmerston has been. Count Ficquelmont 
is surely on this subject a most unexceptionable 
witness. He consistently makes no distinction 
between the policy of Mr. Canning, Lord Aber- 
deen, and Lord Palmerston ; he considers the 
principles, the objects, and the spirit of these 
three statesmen as identical ; and justly dates 
this liberal policy from the last years of Lord 
Castlereagh's administration of Foreign Affairs. 
The conclusion of Count Nesselrode's despatch 
of the 19th of February, on which many speakers 
laid so much stress, was really intended by the 
Emperor Nicholas to produce in the minds of 
Lord Palmerston's political opponents that in- 
dignation which they so keenly expressed. This 
finished specimen of diplomatic composition was 
not written for the Secretary of State, nor for his 
government. It was drawn up for the Opposition 
in Parliament, and it admirably served its pur- 
pose. While Count Nesselrode was remon- 
strating against the blockade of Greece, he was 
thinking about the Turkish Empire, Sir Stratford 
Canning's influence at Constantinople, and the 
naval demonstration in Besika Bay. He there- 
fore placed, as the head and front of Lord Pal- 
merston's offences, the entrance of the ships into 
the outer portion of the Dardanelles, and con- 
cluded with a threatening sentence about Eng- 



426 FOKEIGN POLICY. 

land abusing the advantages of her position, 
pursuing an isolated policy, and freeing herself 
from her engagements to the other Cabinets. 
All these strong reproaches might justly be 
thrown back upon their author and the great 
military Governments of Europe. The three 
allied Powers, and not England, had abused the 
advantages of their position and set themselves 
free from their engagements to her, and she was 
compelled, as in 1822, to oppose their arbitrary 
proceedings. 

The awakened sense of the injustice of that 
continental system which Lord Palmerston had 
so strongly opposed, the courage and ability with 
which single-handed he had fought in the fields 
of diplomacy the battle against Russia, acted on 
the minds of many respected Conservatives, and 
the majority by which the judgment of the 
House of Lords was reversed in the House of 
Commons, was not composed merely of party 
politicians. It was not merely a victory of Whigs 
over Tories. The extreme Liberals of the Peace 
Society swelled the ranks of the opposition, and 
some men who had held high their conservative 
principles in all political vicissitudes, but who also 
had the just national feelings of Englishmen, 
positively refused to join in the vote against 
Lord Palmerston. 



MR. GLADSTONE VISITS NAPLES. 427 

After the great issue had been decided, the 
session of 1850 was rapidly brought to a close, 
and the legislators who had been sitting in judg- 
ment on the foreign policy of twenty years, dis- 
persed themselves to the four winds of heaven. 
The most intellectual and the most earnest of 
Lord Palmerston's opponents went in the autumn 
to Italy, and found himself at last in Naples. 
He was travelling with no political object. Private 
reasons alone had taken him to the Continent. 
He was a highly distinguished member of a party 
which was considered opposed to all revolutionary 
disturbances, and strongly prepossessed in favour 
of established governments. In the last great 
debate he had censured Lord Palmerston for his 
measures in Italy, and had expressed himself 
powerfully against the contemplated separation 
of Sicily from Naples. He might be regarded 
as a friend of King Ferdinand, and disposed to 
view with a favourable eye the exertions which 
this sovereign and his ministers had made to 
preserve the rights of the Neapolitan monarchy. 
But Mr. Gladstone beheld scenes which struck 
him with horror ; he saw in action such a brutal 
tyranny, without aim or purpose except for simply 
increasing human misery, that shocked by all he 
had witnessed^ Conservative and Englishman as 
he was, he felt it a sacred duty to attempt 



428 FOREIGN POLICY. 

to stop the further committal of such crimes. 
He visited the persecuted patriots in their dun- 
geons. With his own hands he grasped their 
chains, and endeavoured to administer consola- 
tion to those whose heads were bowed down in 
despair. 

On his return to England he communi- 
cated the results of his humane investiga- 
tions to Lord Aberdeen, in the hope that 
this nobleman's great private influence might 
induce the King of Naples to unlock the fetters 
his ministers had fastened round the limbs of 
good men and worthy citizens. Months, how- 
ever, passed away, and no relaxation of this exe- 
crable persecution was experienced. Mr. Glad- 
stone then reluctantly sent his Letters to the press, 
and solemnly impeached, before the great bar of 
public opinion, the official miscreants, who, vio- 
lating every divine and human law, and using 
the influences of a Government for the most 
devilish purposes, revelled in the wretchedness 
they inflicted on their fellow-creatures. These 
Letters created a great sensation throughout Eu- 
rope and the civilised world. The Neapolitan 
Ministers found themselves arraigned as criminals. 
They were obliged at last to reply to these grave 
accusations ; and there were Englishmen not 
ashamed to countenance their feeble rejoinder, 



mr. Gladstone's lettees to loud Aberdeen. 429 

and make a show of holding the balance even 
between the accuser and the accused ; as though 
Mr. Gladstone's simple testimony was not of more 
weight than the rambling assertions of any hired 
apologist for such atrocities. The official reply 
to Mr. Gladstone is now forgotten ; his Letters 
remain, and will remain. Before him he has a 
great career; the most accurate observers of 
English politics look the most confidently to his 
future ; so great are his abilities, and so high his 
character, that there is nothing he may undertake 
which he cannot accomplish, and no public sta- 
tion he may aspire to, which he cannot worthily 
fill ; he may live many years ; he may do many 
great things ; he may occupy a great space in 
the history of the reign of Queen Victoria ; but 
whatever may be the lustre of his achievements 
as a statesman, his crowning glory must ever be 
the two little pamphlets in which he pleaded so 
nobly for the manacled Poerio and his suffering 
companions. 

In no person did Mr. Gladstone's denunci- 
ation of Neapolitan tyranny find more hearty 
sympathy than in Lord Palmerston ; nor did he, 
in his high official position, merely praise the 
Letters in the House of Commons and excite 
the cheers of his countrymen. He sent copies of 
the work to the different Embassies abroad, and 



430 FOREIGN POLICY. 

charged the ambassadors to bring them to the 
knowledge of the Governments to which they were 
accredited, that the world might see what a hi- 
deous tyranny was that of King Ferdinand. 
Mr. Gladstone's pamphlets produced political 
consequences. His appeal to the common sen- 
timents of mankind against a barbarous system 
of injustice and oppression had united politicians 
who admired Lord Palmerston and politicians who 
admired Lord Aberdeen, in one strong opinion. 
It was asked whether the principles of .these 
statesmen were quite irreconcilable, or whether 
they could not unite in one powerful government, 
for the honour and the welfare of England. 

The speech which Sir Kobert Peel made in 
the Greek debate was the last he ever uttered ; 
it had acquired the sanctity of dying words; and 
that speech contained a fine eulogium of Lord 
Palmerston. The Secretary for Foreign Affairs 
had in 1841 maintained and even increased his 
reputation, while his colleagues were struggling 
with difficulties which they had brought upon 
themselves by precipitate plans of reform and 
colonial misgovernment. His unrivalled defence 
of his policy had left a deep impression on the 
public mind. But at a time when no great 
questions of foreign policy were being agitated, 
and when the Secretary's enemies seemed to have 



LORD PALMERSTON VACATES OFFICE. 431 

abandoned all hope of overthrowing him in the 
House of Commons, it was suddenly announced, 
to the surprise of all Europe, that Lord Pal- 
merston had retired from the Whig Ministry. 

All men looked forward to the meeting of 
Parliament in the February of 1852, in order to 
learn the reasons for this extraordinary cata- 
strophe. They were given by Lord John Russell 
on the first night of the session; and they have 
ever since remained, as they were thought by 
every impartial person at the time they were de- 
livered, singularly perplexing and unintelligible. 

A statesman with such good intentions and 
so much simplicity of character as Lord John 
Russell cannot have a single personal enemy. 
But in a work embracing the foreign policy of 
so many years, a writer might justly be accused 
of cowardice if he were to hesitate in giving his 
candid opinion of the explanations of the 3rd 
of February, 1852. The two speeches are now 
historical documents ; they cannot be destroyed ; 
they cannot be passed over. It must then be de- 
clared that the reasons Lord John Russell gave 
in explanation of the dismissal of Lord Palmer- 
ston were quite inadequate, and that no suffi- 
cient justification of that most serious deter- 
mination has ever yet been made. It was not 
shown that the Foreign Secretary did anything 



432 FOREIGN POLICY. 

more than express a private opinion to the 
French Ambassador, to the effect that, at a time 
when civil war was imminent in France, and 
when it was clear that the power of the Presi- 
dent and that of the National Assembly could 
not exist together, the arbitrary Government of 
a Louis Napoleon was preferable to the preca- 
rious administration of a M. Thiers and his 
brethren in intrigue. Had this opinion been 
wrong, it was still only the opinion of the 
Foreign Secretary ; and there has always been 
a recognised distinction between private conver- 
sations with an ambassador and public despatches 
to a foreign Government. To what a length Mr. 
Canning went in declaring his sentiments not 
only on affairs abroad, but also on George the 
Fourth himself, may be seen in the letters of 
Marcellus. In later times it was the intimate 
private friendship of Lord Aberdeen and M. 
Guizot which, far more than the public and 
formal acts of Sir Robert Peel's administration 
gave reality to the entente cordiale. 

Had Lord Palmerston then been wrong in 
his opinion, he only compromised himself; 
but there is now no doubt whatever that 
he was right. They who were once hostile, 
but ' are now friendly to the French Emperor, 
may justly say that it was only from experience 



LORD palmerston's POLICY. 433 

that they could judge of the wisdom of the 
measures of Louis Napoleon. But Lord Pal- 
merston was in a different position ; ever since 
the December of 1848 he had been in a situ- 
ation to form a good opinion of the personal 
character of the new Emperor, and of his most 
influential ministers. M. Drouyn de Lhuys, in 
particular, had been in the days of the Republic 
Foreign Minister, and afterwards ambassador to 
the Court of St. James's. In approving the 
President's strong measures in the December of 
1851, Lord Palmerston then, if no other states- 
man did, knew well what he was doing. He 
was not treading on unknown ground. The 
light of the past guided him in the present, and 
gave him confidence in the future. That the 
English Minister, with his great European repu- 
tation, with his boundless knowledge of foreign 
affairs, and his sixteen years' experience in the 
administration of the Foreign Office, may have 
gradually become dictatorial in his deportment, 
and not inclined to listen much to the advice of 
his colleagues, may also be true. But even for 
this there is some excuse. He was not placed 
in his official position to fill up a temporary 
vacancy, or to register the acts of others. A 
minister of his standing and character must be 
taken on his own terms ; the only point to be 

F F 



434 FOKEIGN POLICY. 

settled is, whether the Foreign Minister of this 
great empire is to be a statesman or a clerk. 

This much it was necessary to say on as pain- 
ful a quarrel as ever occurred between two Minis- 
ters, who are both deservedly esteemed. It was 
a pitiful termination to a close friendship which 
appeared until 1851 to grow stronger in the 
wear and tear of public life. The difference was 
only temporary; Lord John Russell and Lord 
Palmer ston are now again in the same Cabinet, 
and every Englishman with any patriotic feeling 
in his bosom must wish that these two associates 
in so many dangers and so much glory may 
continue united until the last moments of their 
political career. It is only England herself who 
must suffer in the unnatural contentions of her 
worthiest sons. 

We are now engaged in a great war which 
requires all the patriotism and ability the 
country can command. England cannot do 
without Lord Palmerston nor Lord John 
Russell ; neither can she do without Lord Aber- 
deen. The attempts which have been made to 
sow dissensions, and to represent Lord John 
Eussell and Lord Palmerston as separated from 
Mr. Gladstone and Lord Aberdeen, are wicked, 
ignorant, and foolish. Those who- have pro- 
pagated such reports know little of Lord Pal- 



COALITION. 435 

merston ; he is incapable of such, conduct ; he has 
never intrigued against the head of any Govern- 
ment of which he has been a member. He was 
faithful to Mr. Canning : he was faithful to the 
successive Whig Prime Ministers ; and he has 
been faithful to Lord Aberdeen. 

Before Lord Aberdeen's Administration was 
constructed, it was denounced as a Coalition ; 
and, in the House of Commons, a declaration 
was made with much emphasis, that there was 
something in the very nature of such a Govern- 
ment displeasing to the English people. Ever 
since then, the organs of the Opposition, taking 
the cue from their Leader, have continued re- 
peating, with parrot-like fidelity, this profound 
aphorism. Like most of the generalities which 
proceed from the same source, it is altogether 
erroneous. There have been other Coalitions 
besides that of Fox and North ; there have 
been great Coalitions extremely popular ; the 
most glorious War Ministries in English history 
have been Coalitions. It was the Coalition be- 
tween the Tories Godolphin and Marlborough on 
the one part, and the Whigs Sunderland and 
Somers on the other, which made Louis the Four- 
teenth, in his old age, after so many years of 
victory, bow his proud head to the dust. It 
was the Coalition of Pitt and Newcastle which 



436 FOREIGN POLICY. 

gave the law to the House of Bourbon, and 
raised the English nation to the highest pinnacle 
of earthly glory. A Coalition seems especially 
suited to a time of war, when mere party dis- 
sensions should be forgotten, and the wisest and 
most experienced statesmen of all political deno- 
minations should unite with one heart and one 
soul in support of their common country. 

From this review of the foreign policy, 
it is clear that a war with Russia was sooner 
or later inevitable. This is a moral which 
every impartial person cannot fail to draw; 
and it may console us amid any temporary 
difficulties, and teach us to bear with pa- 
tience the heavy burdens we may be called 
upon to endure. Since war must have come, it 
could not have come under more favourable cir- 
cumstances. Thirty years of peaceful progress 
and of prudent reform have made the English 
people happy, prosperous, and contented. A 
long peace, with all its blessings, carries with it 
some evil ; as a long war, with all its misery, 
brings with it some good. The evil of this long 
peace was that an unhealthy desire for innovation 
was being engendered ; men were infected with 
a morbid desire to mount up to first principles, 
and to pry into the hidden recesses of their con- 



CONCLUSION. 437 

stitution. The Peace Society was another morbid 
symptom, a moral monstrosity, indicative to the 
careful diagnosis of the state physician that disease 
was lurking somewhere in this great body which 
seemed at the first glance so full of health. 

The good to be set off against the evil of this 
war is, that all schemes for radical change must 
be postponed ; that, anxious for the vigorous 
prosecution and the final success of the contest, 
the most extreme reformers are even desirous of 
putting aside their darling projects. Time is al- 
lowed for the national mind to operate, and for 
the late reforms to harmonise with the older 
parts of the constitution. The most determined 
of innovators and the most stubborn of conserva- 
tives unite in wishing to see the war earnestly 
conducted ; they have this one great principle on 
which they can agree, one sentiment which 
makes them feel that they have a country. 

Never were the people in a better temper than 
at this time. Never was there so much to glad- 
den the heart of a wise statesman. With the 
echo of every cannon-shot from the heights of 
Sebastopol, the pulse of the nation has beat 
stronger and stronger. The people are tho- 
roughly in earnest ; and their earnestness is di- 
rected to a wise object. They make allowance 
for difficulties, they are prepared to encounter 



438 FOREIGN POLICY. 

obstacles ; but they know well that there is no 
retreat ; that the way to peace is through war ; 
that all that is dear to them as men and English- 
men is embarked in the struggle ; and that they 
must either conquer or be conquered. The noble 
sight which England now presents deserves the 
attention of every man who considers himself a 
statesman. The minister who cannot appreciate 
this lofty spirit, and does not believe it to be of 
more account in a long war than all the accu- 
mulations of wealth and mechanism, is unfit to 
rule a great empire ; for he does not understand 
his own business, and knows nothing of the 
high science of government. The people are 
more eager to give than their Ministers to 
take. They are resolved not to return the 
sword, they have reluctantly drawn, again to 
its scabbard, until it shall have dictated a 
peace which can be truly called a peace; a 
peace which shall include all the essential ob- 
jects of the war; and not a peace containing 
such immoral stipulations as those which re- 
ceived the sanction of the European Congress 
of 1814 and 1815 ; not a peace such as is desired 
by some continental politicians, by whom the 
brains and hearts of men are subjected to a 
callous process of diplomatic lixivation, that they 
may come out of their laboratory crystallised, 



CONCLUSION. 439 

like nitre, into a hard and brittle substance, but 
which also, like nitre, is explosive. 

The Government is as sensible as the people 
of the magnitude of the struggle in which they 
are engaged. No Minister knows it better than 
Lord Aberdeen. It was because he was fully 
aware of the importance of the war, and of the 
mighty exigencies which would ensue, that he 
felt it his duty to the last moment to endeavour 
to preserve peace. He knew well that a contest 
with Russia was not, what some absurd theorists 
imagined it, a mere rapid melodramatic spectacle, 
such as may be witnessed at Astley's and the 
Adelphi theatre. Lord Aberdeen is, what his 
most inveterate opponent is not, a statesman, 
and a statesman of a high order. The liberal 
members of the House of Commons may feel 
confident that this Minister, with Lord Palmer- 
ston as his colleague, is much more likely 
to carry on this contest to a worthy issue 
than the man who is the only English po- 
litician that ever dreamed of apologising for 
the partition of Poland. That deed is hated 
by the people of this country because it out- 
raged those moral sentiments which Provi- 
dence, for wise purposes, has rooted in their 
hearts. It was this English morality which, 
more than the military force of the nation, van- 



440 FOREIGN POLICY. 

quished Philip the Second and Louis the Four- 
teenth. . It was this English morality which 
struck down in its lofty flight the Imperial Eagle 
of Napoleon. And it is this same English 
morality which, however humble it may appear 
to those who are neither conservative, national, 
nor Christian, has now taken its stand in the 
path of the Emperor of Russia, and, more 
potent than the bayonets of six hundred thou- 
sand warriors, will, like a sword of fire grasped 
by an unseen but Almighty hand, prevent him 
from ever entering Constantinople. 



THE END, 



A. and G. A. Spottiswoode, 
Mew-street-Square. 



RBMr'26 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



020 665 452 1 






■i 



